tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-15459960361321659612024-02-19T04:53:18.721-09:00The Rogue WaveMr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.comBlogger46125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-48647688834919935312015-05-06T06:28:00.002-08:002015-05-06T06:28:40.943-08:00<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<span style="color: #00b0f0;">This
Afternoon at the RnR Bar, Radio Redux</span></div>
<div class="MsoTitleCxSpLast" style="line-height: 150%;">
Radioplay Number 1</div>
</div>
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Narrator:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Welcome to Kodiak, greatest fishing port in
the world, located on the stormy Eastern edge of the Gulf of Alaska. And here
in the corner of the boat harbor we find the RnR Bar, refuge of the weary mariner.
Let’s step inside, and listen…</div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">BIRDIE:</b> Here’s your beer Crazy Mike. That’ll be five bucks. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Birdie can we <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">please </i>change the channel?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIRDIE: No, Crazy Mike, we can’t.
That’ll be five bucks.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Birdie, can I ask you a
question?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIRDIE: The answer is five
bucks.Plus a generous tip.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Birdie, who watches the news in a bar? Who
Birdie? Nobody! That’s who! Bar TVs are reserved for the watching of sports, or
maybe a game show. Never the news. Never.</div>
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BIRDIE: Why not? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Because the bar is
where you come to escape. To get away from the fearful things in the outside
world.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: Like your Ex girlfriend?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Yes, Dave. I come here to escape terrible
things like Mindy. And would you please back me up on this one? The news is all
about airplanes crashing and global warming and machine gunners in running wild
in the streets. You can’t show news in a bar, Birdie. It’s cruel. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Back me up on this one Dave. You can’t give
people alcohol and make them watch the news. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It’s doubling down on the depressants. Put on
something good, like Bulwinkle or Judge Judy. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Right , Dave? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Right? Dave!</div>
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DAVE: No.No, no leave it on. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I like the news. Its not depressing. It makes
you feel good. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Watching victims suffer
makes you feel like you don’t have it so bad. I was </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: But it’s spooky. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I don’t want to be spooked while I’m trying to
relax. </div>
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<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">DAVE: </b>Yes you do. That’s the fun part. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>OK? Alright? You <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">want</b> to be scared.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>OK? You <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">need</i> it. Alright? Also also also- yoru’re
just reacting to the subliminal subtext. OK? They use repeating flash images.
Its subliminal, alright? OK? Pictures you can barely even <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">see</b>.
Flash flash flash. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>They tickle your
brain with fear. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And you like it. Scary
things. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Like a beardy terrorist holding a
knife or, or, or… <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>you know calfing
glaciers and stuff. Your brain is not even aware of it. You know? <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">But you like it.</i> Alright? You Like it. Because
the average person doesn’t have enough excitement in his life. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s why. That’ how they get you. You can’t
stop watching. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Then the Ron Burgundy on
the TV tells you that everyone else is driving a Tesla and they have two
perfect kids in the back holding up trophies and they’re all <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">laughing</i> at you because you don’t have <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">any</i> of that stuff and then a commercial
comes on to tell you about a cologne you can put on that will make everybody forget
what a loser you are . You see how it works? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You see? You’re afraid <b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">not</b> to buy it. Also, have you ever noticed how much darker
President Obama is lately? He's darker now. They made him darker.<br />
BIG MIKE:. What are you<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> talking</i>
about? (Pauses) Nobody wears cologne anymore. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIRDIE: What do you call that cloud
of stink you spray all over yourself before you come in here?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is my signature aroma. Its called
Hatchet.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: Its <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>making my eyes water..</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIRDIE: Its frizzing my hair.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Big Mike you are a
three hundred pound man with your own atmosphere. You could be declared a
planet.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: You should be declared a
terrorist. That stuff is having a jihad on my nervous system.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIRDIE: I like Hatchet better than
the way you guys normally smell. And the <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>part of the news I hate is the disparaging
between rich and poor.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: The what?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIRDIE: You know the disparaging
between rich and poor. Like the rich are all: “Those lazy poor people are
wasting my money with their Welfare.” And the Poor go: “Those rich guys are
trickling down on my head and taking away my guns and Christmas.”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: That can’t be right.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: No, that’s pretty accurate.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Now hang on, Wait a
minute. How do they make Obama darker? That’s ridiculous.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That's so easy. Oh that's so easy. They use a
dark filter on the camera lens. A dark <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">filter</i>.
Same shot six years ago Obama looks like Arthur Ashe. Now he looks like Wesley
Snipes. Everyone around him is darker, too. The Caucasians all look like Latinos,
and, and <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the Chinese Americans turn into
Cambodians, and the Pakistani Americans all look like African Americans. And
you know why? You know why? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That’s
because their target audience is scared old immobilized white people. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>All Grandpa Reclinerchair sees is this army of
minorities coming out of the tellyvisionset, you know, like these caramelized
zombies, you know, lurching toward them out of the screen, grabbing at their
jobs and applying for resident status and thirsty for the flesh of their pale
young granddaughters. It’s the reason old people vote.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: So it’s alcohol and
fear? Is that better?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: Yeah man, delicious fear.
It’s our version of bungee jumping. Its like slasher movies and roller coasters
and lutefisk- once you get a taste for it you keep coming back for the thrill
of the chill. . They sell delicious fear, man, and people are buying it like
crazy.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE : You know… why do we call
<i>him</i> Crazy Mike? You ain't exactly Sane Dave.<br />
CRAZY MIKE:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Hey you’re <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>right. Why do I have to be <i>Crazy</i> Mike?
You know it would be so cool if someday somebody would just call me Mike. Just <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Mike. My friends used to call me Mike. My <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Mom</i> used to call me Mike. Now its
"Good Morning Crazy Mike. Here's your beer, Crazy Mike..."<br />
BIRDIE: Yeah I still need five bucks for that beer Crazy Mike</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: Your Mom calls you Crazy
Mike?<br />
CRAZY MIKE: Yeah I’m pretty sure she’s the one who started it. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>(There is a sympathetic murmur) Well from now
on I want to be plain old Mike. You know how hard it is to meet women when
everyone introduces you as Crazy Mike?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIRDIE: Yeah but all the women in this
town already know who you are.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: It’s too late dude.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: The jig is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">up</i>.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: You should be at the dock
when the ferry comes in so you can catch the new ones.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: Yeah Introduce yourself as
“Not Crazy Mike”</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: Huh! Might as well
introduce yourself as “Handsome Mike” the misapprehension will last about the
same length of time. (There is agreement)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: I don’t want to be any
kind of Mike!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: That’s what your mom
said.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>JUST PLAIN MIKE!<br />
DAVE: We can’t man, no way. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Look, it's
just practicality. There are just way too many Mikes in the Kodiak fishing
fleet. And we live on an island, so there's no way for all the Mikes to spread
around. You're all concentrated up. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So
all the Mikes have to have a title. Like... there’s Irish Mike over there
playing pool and he's Big Mike and you're Crazy Mike. That’s three Mikes just
in this bar right now. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And think of all
other the Mikes we know-there's uh, that guy from Florida, Minnesota Mike, <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and there’s <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Stupid Mike- he teaches out at the college,
and Lucky Mike, although he’s in prison now. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And then there’s Three Finger Mike, who worked
at the sawmill for a while, and then of course the Mikes you identify by boat,
like Predator Mike…</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: I’ll bet he doesn’t call
himself that down south.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>DAVE:<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>and,
uh, Spicy Lady Mike…</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Him neither.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Yeah well, I still
don't see why I have to be<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> Crazy</i> Mike
... I should be Normal Mike.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Not what your Mom said.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIRDIE: Look Whoever Mike, I need
five bucks for that beer you’re drinking. And a big tip, at this point.<br />
CRAZY MIKE: Aw, just put it on my tab, Birdie!<br />
BIRDIE: You don't have a tab. Nobody has a tab no more. No more tabs. Nope, not
gonna do it.<br />
CRAZY MIKE: What? Since when?<br />
BIRDIE: Since you guys don't pay. Also no more personal loans and no more mail
that smells funny and no more free coffee in the morning.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>CRAZY MIKE: Whaaaaat? We <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">just</i> started the fishing season, Birdie. Most of the fleet hasn't
paid out a single settlement yet. And <i>n</i><i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">ow</i> no more tabs? <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">Now?</i> <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You know what this place means to us. This is
the fisherman's home. Its right across the street from the boat harbor. Why,
the steady tramp<i> </i>of the thirsty, hardworking fisherman in and out of
here, why its <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>the very life's blood of
this fine fine institution.. It always has been, Birdie. Always has been. For
nearly a hundred years, now. Who are you to spit in the face of history?
Whalers came to this bar, Birdie! Whalers! Think what <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">they</i> musta smelled like! And now you're going to tell a poor tired old
deckhand with a dry mouth that he can't slake his hot thirst today and repay
when he get paid, and a big fat check it’s gonna be too, it’ll be coming in oh
I'd say tomorrow, or maybe at the latest the next day?<br />
BIG MIKE: Dude, that was a poem<br />
BIRDIE: Yeah, well five bucks, Longfellow Mike</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Wait a minute… Hold
onto your tie line- here comes Carcass! Carcass! How was the fishing out in
Dutch?<br />
CARCASS: I am rich for a day my brothers! Drinks! Drinks! Drinks for all my friends!
(His voice is raspy, like he gargles with battery acid..) Glory! Glory to us my
friends for I have been paid, and today I am rich! Drinks for alllllllll my
friends!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Now we’re talking. I'll
take another Liquid Sunshine, Birdie.<br />
BIRDIE: Carcass is payin' for the one you just drank. <br />
CRAZY MIKE: Aw, c'mon Birdie. (Turning to Carcass) Carcass, I already drank the
beer you just bought me.<br />
CARCASS: Another beer for my friend Crazy Mike!<br />
CRAZY MIKE: Hah! <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Ah hah! Thank you my
good friend, you are a scholar and a gentleman. A liquid Sunshine and a shot of
Chivas please, Bernie.<br />
BERDIE: He didn't say anything about a shot.<br />
CARCASS: Shots for everyone! (There is general acclamation.)<br />
BIRDIE: Hey um don't look now you guys but here comes your skipper, Mr Clean.
(They mutter unhappily.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>MR. CLEAN: Guys, guys, guys...what's going on
here? Its four o'clock in the afternoon! Four o’clock. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I come down to the boat, and nobody is there!
I didn't know what to think. I didn’t know. Was there an emergency? Did someone
get hurt? I didn’t know. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I got the parts
in right my hand, all the parts for the pump; you know the one we are supposed
to be rebuilding. I look all around but no crew, and no note… and well it’s
just lucky I looked in here, that's all.<br />
CRAZY MIKE: That <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">was</i> lucky.<br />
BIG MIKE: Yeah lucky guess, finding us here.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: Well you might as well have a
beer now that you’re here.<br />
CARCASS: A beer and a shot for Mr. Clean! (There is a clamor of agreement..)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
MR. CLEAN: No more drinking!, I got
some egg mcmuffins and coffees down on the boat. Come on Leeeeet’s go.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: (Excitedly) Hey leggo
my Eggo, Mr. Clean! You’re brought us Mc breakfast?? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You left to get those parts six and a half
hours ago! The hydraulic shop is <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">across
the street</i>! How many lattes have you had since then? <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>You skippers all flock up at the top of the
ramp like a bunch of seagulls cluckin and struttin and lyin to each other…
Wasn’t so bad before all that fancy strong coffee. Well forget about it! Times
up! We're off the clock! Birdie give me another beer! And a shot!<br />
MR. CLEAN: You know what you are Crazy Mike? You’re a rabble rouser. You’re a
trouble maker. You spread the seeds of discontent. Your Mom warned me about
you. I never should have hired you and you are this close to getting fired
right now. This close! <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And if you make
me to fire you now, in the middle of the season, when I need you the most- You
will<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> never</i> work in this town again.
Your name will be dirt!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: Hey there you go! How
about Dirty Mike? That works too, right?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
MR CLEAN: He’s going to be Jobless
Mike.<br />
CRAZY MIKE: Hah! Listen here Billy White Shoes Skipperton. You don't scare me.
I've been blackballed outta the fleet more times than I've been 86'd outta this
bar! <br />
BIRDIE: Here are your drinks, Mr. Clean.<br />
MR. CLEAN: I don't <i>want</i> any drinks and <i>don't</i> call me Mr. Clean.
Why does everyone call me that? BIRDIE: You are literally the cleanest person
who's ever come into this bar.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: You are way too clean.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: It’s like a fetish.
It’s not normal for a fisherman. Fishermen are filthy beasts.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: Fishermen are salty. And a
little sticky.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIRDIE: Yeah. You guys are like the
dredge of society.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: The what?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIRDIE: You know, the Dredge of
Society. You just drag along the bottom, you know, just scraping along in the
mud getting all dirty and scummy…But sometime there’s money in your pocket</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m pretty sure that’s not right.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIRDIE: You’re tellin me. No money
in <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">your</i> pocket.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
MR. CLEAN: Well all the other
skippers are calling me Mr. Clean now. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I’m
not even bald. It’s not cool.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: What<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> is </i>your real name, anyway?<br />
MR. CLEAN: It’s Mike.<br />
BIRDIE: Well here’s your beer, Clean Mike.<br />
MR. CLEAN: Yeah. What? No. I don't want...(There is a clamor for him to drink.)
Look guys I have the parts now...we cannot hang around the bar all afternoon.
We need to get to work right now!<br />
BIG MIKE: All right Skipper. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Tell you
what. Tell you what. Make you a deal. If you can drink that beer faster than Dave
here, we will go down to that boat right now and rebuild that pump. But if he
wins we're done for the day.<br />
MR. CLEAN: (Smiling) Nobody can drink a beer faster than I can. Nobody. I'm the
fastest in the State.<br />
BIG MIKE: So you have claimed.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Idle boasting around
the wheelhouse. That's all I know about.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: Only one way to know for
sure.<br />
MR. CLEAN: (Still smiling) Alright, OK then, c'mon big boy. You're on! (Beers
clink)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: One two three-drink! (They
both drink. Mr. Clean clearly wins.)<br />
MR. CLEAN: Allllll-right boyos, I win, let's go. Let's jump on the pump. (He is
already noticeably looser.)<br />
BIG MIKE: Two out of three.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: C'mon, two out of
three!<br />
MR. CLEAN: No way. Let's go. <br />
BIG MIKE: Two out of three and if you win we stay up all night remeasuring
those buoy lines.<br />
MR. CLEAN: Nooo…wait. Why? What's wrong with them? Are they too long? No no no.
Too short, right? Too short!<br />
BIG MIKE: No, no they’re fine, I mean I don't know.. I'm just saying.<br />
MR. CLEAN: I knew it! I knew there was something funny about the buoy lines! I've
been watching you guys when you're setting them. You're always looking up at
the wheelhouse at me and pointing and laughing! Why are you guys always
laughing?<br />
BIRDIE: I wonder.<br />
BIG MIKE: (Loudly) All I'm saying is......it's an awful deep ocean, that's all.<br />
MR. CLEAN: Alright, alright, you're on! You're on! You guys are gonna be
rebuilding and remeasuring<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>all night
long! (Birdie sets two more in front of them.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: One two three- drink! </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
MR. CLEAN:I win again, I win again!
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Lez go now, lez go! Lez go you smelly
fellers. Let's measure that pump.<br />
BIG MIKE: No no, its two out of three, you have to drink three.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: Its two out of <i>three</i>.
You gotta drink three. You're not a cheater are ya? <br />
MR. CLEAN: Ahm notta cheater! OK OK alright. Set em up, hurry up, gotta start
pumping. (Birdie sets up two more.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: One two three- drink!<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
MR CLEAN: I win I win I win agin.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: And the shot.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: Don't forget the shot.
You're not a cheater, are you?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
MR. CLEAN: Nodda cheader! Gimme the
shot (Clunk of empty shot glass) Lez go, bro, lez go! I got the pump!(There is
the sound of MR CLEAN hitting the ground.)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
MR. CLEAN: Whoa Nelly. I have
fallen nan nigh cand getup. Where's my foot? Helb me yup fellas!<br />
BIG MIKE: Fastest drinker in the state, and the biggest lightweight in the
nation. Up we go Mr Cleanio! Lets get you back on that stool.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Best thing is he always
forgets. Forgets everything. He drinks fast, he blacks out, he wakes up around
the crack of noon the next day--complete mind erase. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I know. And he's always so embarrassed he
never asks you what happened. He just plays it off like he spent the evening
playing billiards with the Earl of Sandwich.<br />
BIG MIKE: Whoa whoa let's get you back up here Mr. Cleanio. Hey didn't you just
order another round? I don't think Birdie heard you.<br />
MR. CLEAN: Nother round, Birdie. I'm the winner!<br />
BIRDIE: Yes, you are. But I think you’ve already had enough, amazingly.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Never seen a man get
through a day so fast.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
MR. CLEAN: Ahhhhhh...Yah ok Birdie.Gimme
a Doctor. Pepper. I’m a Pepper.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: (Aside) And shots for
everyone else!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
MR CLEAN: Yeah an shots fer
ev'rybody!(There is acclamation) <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Expecting for that guy there......no shot fer <i>Crazy
</i>Mike. (He pronounces this with drunken gravity) Because he gets too drunk
when he's all weird like that. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: What? You slobbering
ingrate! And after I helped you up off the floor? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: No, he's right, dude. You
get weird. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: You get Charles Manson weird.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: You get all googly eyed.
Always happens with the shots.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: Stick to the beer, dude.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Shut up Dave. Beer is
the cake. Shots are the frosting.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: You get too frosted.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: Stick to the cake, dude.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: You should stick to
bread.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: You should stick to pilot
bread.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Every time you do shots you do something
freaky.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Every time I do shots
you guys start this every time I do shots thing. It's a myth! An urban legend!
A fabrication of your diseased minds! </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: Remember what you did in
the bilge? In Dutch Harbor?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: OK that was bad, but
that was just the one time. And that doesn't count. It was after an intense
drinking contest. I was representing the vessel, man.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: Yeah, but it was against
a girl.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: (Dreamily) Yeah. Yeah.
Just couldn't keep up with that girl. Tiny little thing. Maybe weighed a
hundred and ten pounds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Name was Juanita,
I believe. I fell in love with her while we pounded shots of Jaeger. (Reflectively)
Nice<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> looking</i> girl, I think. Yeah real
attractive girl I'm pretty sure. She could put away the Jagermeister, I
remember that much. In fact my last clear memory of that night was of her red
shoes surrounded by a whole bunch of brown rubber boots. Yeah, nice girl
though, nice girl.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: Well I'm glad you have a
nice foggy memory. The bilge smelled like corned beef for the rest of the
season.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: And what about that time in
Akutan? Did you <i>ever</i> find your pants?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: (In a low voice)No.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: And that time in the
Mecca with Jimmy Buffet. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: And the flare.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>DAVE: And that poor parrot. Why would anyone
do that to an innocent bird?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: That was never proved.
Another scurrilous rumor, as far as I can remember. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: Spread by the parrot?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Well I can tell you
that parrot was far from innocent in any case.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: I can attest to that.</div>
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CRAZY MIKE: Anyway I am a
completely different person now. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: Who are you now? </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: Dirty Mike, remember?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: No I mean
scientifically. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: Oh don't do it it, man.
Its a scam. They want you to worship Tom Cruise</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Not Scientology you
nit, science! Your whole body recopies itself every nine months. Its a
scientific fact. Your self is made out of cells. But cells don't live very
long. So all the cells in your body are making copies of themselves to take
their own place when they die. By the time nine months goes by all the cells in
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copy of yourself. It’s like using the Xerox to make a copy out of a copy out of
a copy. The next copy is never as good. Eventually the image just fades out and
gets weak and gray and wrinkly until you can hardly see it anymore. </div>
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CARCASS: Is that true?</div>
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that goes by I am a just a more faded version of me?</div>
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CRAZY MIKE: Every nine months.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: I don't know. That just
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wimpier version of the same guy who can't do shots. </div>
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CRAZY MIKE: No but my point is how
do you know? If I have all new cells then I am a completely new person. These
cells might literally be a new person. How could I tell? The guy I used to be
nine months ago is gone. He’s gone! I could be a completely different person
with a different personality, different needs and wants and abilities. How
would I know?</div>
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know? You're a completely different person too. </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: I kind of like this idea.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: Naw man that can't be true
because all of us are just entities of consciousness anyways.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Shut up Dave. What?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: Entities of consciousness.
The universe only contains a limited amount of consciousnesseses (He struggles
pronouncing this.). Yours consciousness is just stuck in your body for
now.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After you die it might float around
and be a ghost or it might make a camp inside a newborn baby.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Or sometimes it can be a dog.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: Shut up Dave.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CRAZY MIKE: Oh yeah. <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">I'm</i> the crazy one.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: Hang on. I am intrigued by
Dave's mythology. What about before there were people? Where did the
personalities camp out at then?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: We used to live in minds of
the ants. They had a great civilization once, long long ago.</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
CARCASS: Cool. Ants. What about
dinosaurs?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
DAVE: Dinosaurs are a myth!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIRDIE: Shut up Dave. So who gets a
shot?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
BIG MIKE: Everybody. Let's test
Crazy Mike's theory. Hey Mr. Clean! Ready to buy another round?</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
MR CLEAN: Hab anudder round of
shots Birdie! I’m a winner!</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
(There is general Acclamation)</div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
NARRATOR: As the sun sets on the
RNR Bar, our intrepid mariners continue to plumb the deep issues of the day.
Tune in again </div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
<br /></div>
<br />
<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFLxBbOJOgBjIDaWoDXFHjoP7JsUbd58-KIg-tAFoEiKIWGXc7gaSYmRdt4-0GY8iTXOLevfCd-Zieymguunbcnsw7bmqcSdzMB7QIhU75VqyHeCdgM4G1vUNDTPJnFIvYIRSI7zvNzNaD/s1600/Lu+Lu.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgFLxBbOJOgBjIDaWoDXFHjoP7JsUbd58-KIg-tAFoEiKIWGXc7gaSYmRdt4-0GY8iTXOLevfCd-Zieymguunbcnsw7bmqcSdzMB7QIhU75VqyHeCdgM4G1vUNDTPJnFIvYIRSI7zvNzNaD/s1600/Lu+Lu.jpg" height="400" width="300" /></a></div>
Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-14473142708985426042015-05-02T09:01:00.001-08:002015-05-02T09:01:59.455-08:00<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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Radioskit<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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</h1>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
A Meeting of the Constitutional Freedoms
And Rights Taskforce.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chairman: All right if everyone has a beer
now, I would like to call this meeting of the Constitutional Freedoms and
Rights Taskforce to order. (Banging gavel) First order of business I guess
would be what kind of antics are we planning for the next meeting of the Zoning
Board?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: Objection! I object to the word
“antics” and demand it be stricken from the record.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: We don’t have a record Arnie,
and if we did it would be you taking it, seeing as how you’re the Secretary. So
strike away, old fellow.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: What? What’s Dave talking about?
When did<i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;"> I</i> get to be the Secretary?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chairman: You… were unanimously voted
Secretary at the last meeting.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: But I wasn’t at the last meeting!</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: Well Mr. Secretary, that’s why
you should attend the meetings.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Professor Pete: Point of Order, Mr.
Chairman. Robert’s Rules dictate that each speaker be recognized in turn by the
Chair.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And might I suggest we confine
our comments to those pertinent to the agenda?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chairman: OK Pete, duly noted. Let’s take
turns talkin’ and <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">please</i> try to
confine your comments. Remember what happened at the last meeting.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: I do not.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chairman: I don’t doubt that, Dave. Which
is why we are going to try to stick to the two beer limit tonight. Yes, Arnie?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: I refuse to raise my hand for
recognition by a Chairman, or any other pseudodictatorial ---</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chairman: Arnie you just raised your hand
to say that you refuse to raise your hand.<br />
Arnie: It’s demeaning. I refuse to show my supplication by demonstrating that I
am unarmed and helpless with my open palm.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chair: Well Arnie is there an alternate
form of signaling that you would find less oppressive?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: We could just nod.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chair: Would that be OK Arnie? Could we all
nod like equals? Seeing you are nodding I’ll take that as a yes. All in favor
of nodding signify by nodding…Pete you aren’t nodding…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Professor Pete: I would prefer to continue
to raise my hand.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chair: All right all in favor of either
nodding or raising your hand signify by nodding or raising your hand. Ok,
everyone? Great. Really getting somewhere now.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: It’s already much better than
the last meeting.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chair: So let’s go on to, let’s call it,
“ways we can get our message across” at the next meeting of the zoning board.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: We should fly the Libertarian Flag.
It’s the ultimate symbol of our Constitutional freedom to be free from
governmental overreach.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: What does it look like?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: It is completely blank, symbolizing
our total disdain for pagan symbols, which the government uses to control us,
and take away our rights.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: And our guns.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: And our guns.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chair: So… it’s completely white?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: Yes. It is without the stain of
branding or allegiance to <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">any</i> special
interests. </div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Professor Pete: Are you suggesting we
arrive carrying a white flag?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Dave: Yeah, that might kind of send the
wrong signal.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Pete: Studies show that nothing works
better than a simple placard with a sharply worded synopsis of one’s position.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: A what?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chair: A sign, Dave.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: Oh that’s a great idea! I saw
one the other day that had a snake holding a shotgun and it said (In deep
voice) “Don’t Tread On Me”. We should get one of those. </div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: No, our signs should just say End
Government Overreach. In red letters.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: With a snake?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: No, Dave, not with a snake. That
doesn’t make sense. End Government Overreach and then a picture of a snake? It
doesn’t make sense.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: Which is why it has to say:
“Don’t Tread On Me”. Everyone knows that means stay away from my
constitutionally guaranteed Rights and Freedoms. </div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Pete: Actually those would both be subject
to considerable subjective interpretation. I suggest a slogan that makes reference
to the octopus like encroachment of the Military Industrial Complex on the
regulations and institutions that govern our everyday lives, and the ever
increasing surveillance of American Citizens and other encroachments on our
rights and privacies, alongside the inevitable police state that ensures our
unwitting compliance to our own enslavement.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: Oh yeah, that’s pretty snappy.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: Let me see you fit that on a T
shirt.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: It has to be something short and
angry.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: Like “Don’t Tread On Me”.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: Nobody says “Tread” anymore.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: What about a tire tread, dude?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: That’s totally different. Your Tread
means “step”.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: Yeah, well that’s where the car
steps, man.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Pete: Point of Order Mr. Chairman, I think
this is a good example of the discussion running away from the Agenda.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chair: Yeah, OK <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I have an idea. Everyone just make his own
sign. In fact keep your signs secret until the night of the meeting. Ok?
Everyone nodding or raising his hand? Great. Next order of business is, in fact,
T shirts. Um here is the box. We just got them from the print shop today. Now
we couldn’t fit the entire name on the T shirt, Constitutional Freedom and
Rights Task Force is a little long, so we used the acronym. We are the… C-F…A-R-T.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: C Fart?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: Oh boy.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Pete: Ill considered acronyms are often a
mortal blow to an incipient organization.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chair: I just have to refer back to the two
beer rule here.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: C-Fart?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: Why did we use the A for “and”? At
least then it would be C-F-R-T. You never give “And” a letter! It’s an
insignificant word! You don’t give a letter to “Of” or “The” or..or..”Or”!</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: Or, or, or? I think you’re
turning into a seal over there, Arnie.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: I’m going to seal your lips.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: Maybe you “otter” consider your
words more carefully.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: So help me, Dave I have Mindy’s
number on speed dial and I will have her down here so fast…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: Hey! Not cool! The bro code,
man.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Pete: Point of Order, Mr. Chairman…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chair: You know we could just run with this
thing. How about C-FART: Silent But Deadly?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Crazy Dave: But we aren’t silent.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Pete: Perhaps Invisible Yet Potent?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Arnie: Are we seriously trying to spin
this? Well I’m out of here. I have to go back to work and punch out anyway.
Here, give me one of those shirts. I’ll see you losers at the Zoning meeting.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Chair: OK, good meeting, good meeting. All
in favor of making Arnie the Chairman for the next meeting nod or raise your
hand… unanimous? OK, and this meeting is adjourned.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast">
<br /></div>
Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-15389574863682098472015-05-01T05:42:00.001-08:002015-05-01T05:42:59.385-08:00<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
<h1 align="center" style="text-align: center;">
Radioskits</h1>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpFirst" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">1.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Brainstar</b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: (Whistling happily against a faint
background of motor noises) Aw look at that sunshine! It’s a perfect day! I am
enjoying a perfect cup of coffee… (Slurps) and my first day drivin’ to work in
my new car. The car I’ve waited for my whole life. Every bell or whistle known
to man. Heated leather bucket seats with adjustable lumbar support, that’s my
favorite. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>So comfortable. And look at
this dashboard. Looks like a 747 in here. In fact I’m not even sure how to turn
the radio on…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: (In a flat voice) Which channel
would you like sir?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Holy Moley the car’s talkin’ to me!
Who is that? Who’s there?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: I am Brainstar sir, your onboard
computer. Might I suggest Channel 105.1? I have selected it judging from your
whistling and speech patterns. (Music begins to play in the background)With
your permission I will begin your preprogrammed Shiatsu massage. (A low rumble
is heard) Also your left front tire is slightly low on air. I am adjusting it
now. (Air noise)</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Well thank you Brainstar, that’s real
nice. Oh man, this is so cool. A car computer! I’m drivin the dang Starship
Enterprise here! I’ve gotta to text Roger about this. Let’s see, um, Contacts,
no uh Favorites, uh Message…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: Sir <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">might</i> I point out the telephone pole in our direct pathway?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Hang on just a second Brainiac.
(Screeching tires and yelling)Okay, here we go. Hey. Roger. Guess. What.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: Sir, a catastrophic collision <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">is</i> imminent.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: I. Got. A. Car. Computer. (He sounds
out the last word slowly as he spells it)</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: Activating discretionary
steering adjustment capability. Avoiding hazard. (Screeching tires)</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: What the…well, Brainstar did you just
keep me from crashin’? That is so cool. I gotta text Roger about this. Hey.
Roger. Guess. What.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: Sir it is expressly illegal to
text while driving in this State. Perhaps I should alert the authorities?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Hang on there Brainy! Don’t drop a
dime on a fella! I’m puttin’ it away. I’m putting it away! Gotta pull into the
drive through right here anyhow. Gonna get me a nice Eggabacon samwich. Ohhhh <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>yeah. With a nice greasy fried oval hashbrown
and extra large extra caffeinated cola. It’s the true breakfast of champions.
I’ll just pull right in here…hey what’s wrong with the wheel? </div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: Activating discretionary
steering adjustment capability. Avoiding hazard. (Screeching tires)</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Hey Braintree, what’s up? I need me
some Eggabacon, man!</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: Sir weight sensors located in
your heated leather bucket seat indicate that you do not require a meal package
featuring starches, sugars and partially hydrogenated oils. </div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Awww you sound just like my wife.
(Ringing) Aw gee that’s her calling now. Why do women call when they know you’re
driving?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: Sir I can connect you through my
Bluetooth system for a hands free conversation.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Uh, no that’s OK Brainy. Gotta keep my
attention on the road you know. Concentrate on my drivin’.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: I am sorry sir. Perhaps you
would prefer to text her.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Hey there…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: Connecting now.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Wait…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Mindy: Hello? David? Hello? Are you driving
to work?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Yes Mindy I’m driving. You always call
when I’m driving. Speaking of which I think there’s something wrong with this
car. It wouldn’t let me have an eggabacon sammich just now.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Mindy: Oooo that’s wonderful! I programmed
all the defaults and protocols last night while you watched Judge Judy.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: She is tough but fair.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Mindy: The car must be following its
healthy living protocols. It should also refuse to pull into bars <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">and</i> Borough Assembly meetings.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: What? Who’s driving this car anyway? Who’s
in charge here?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Mindy: I am. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And you should probably also know that I am
tracking your position on a pop up screen on my computer right now.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: You are what? My position is being
constantly tracked by my wife?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: Yes. And the National Security
Administration.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: And the wait what?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: Certain patterns in your user
profile required me to flag you as a mid level potential security risk.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: But I don’t remember filling out a
user profile.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Mindy: Oh I filled that out for you, David.
You know how you hate to do those things.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Yes and this is why!</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Mindy: And you never answer the questions
honestly, David. You have to be honest when you fill out your user profile.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: No you don’t. You really don’t.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Mindy: Anyway, maybe now you won’t stop at
that brewery place after work.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: I had no intention of stopping there
tonight.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: Sir, lie detector sensors located
in your heated leather seat indicate otherwise. Perhaps I should update your
user profile to indicate a generally untrustworthy nature.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Mindy: Oh you should, Brainstar, you really
should. He lies to everybody. He even lies to himself.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Now hang on a minute you two…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: If you wish I could run a
standard reprogramming program during morning drive time. It is positive,
patriotic and NSA approved.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Mindy: Oh that sounds nice.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: No that’s OK Braindrain. Just put that
105.1 radio station back on.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Brainstar: All my drivers find the
reprogramming program quite inspirational. It is hosted by The Rock and Kermit
the Frog. (The Muppets “Get Along Song” begins to play)</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: No, no…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Mindy: Alrighty David I’ll see you right
after work! </div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Noooo…(The Muppets play out and fade)</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">+</b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle" style="mso-list: l0 level1 lfo1; text-indent: -.25in;">
<b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;"><span style="mso-bidi-font-family: Calibri; mso-bidi-theme-font: minor-latin;"><span style="mso-list: Ignore;">2.<span style="font: 7.0pt "Times New Roman";"> </span></span></span></b><b style="mso-bidi-font-weight: normal;">Secret Service Job Interview</b></div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Good Morning Mr. Jeffcoat and thank
you for your interest in the United States Secret Service. Please have a seat.
This will be your preliminary interview. As you know, we have had a few, well,
embarrassing incidents lately, and as a result we have some positions to fill.
So we have begun to look at prospects from other government agencies. I see you
have served with distinction with the United States Postal Service for oh let’s
see, twenty four years now.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Jeffcoat: You saying I’m crazy?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Um. No. No of course not.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Jeffcoat: Because I’m not.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: (laughing nervously) OK. Writing that
down. Not. Crazy. Heh heh. Because that is one of our requirements. Right.
Anyhow, can you briefly describe your duties at…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Jeffcoat: You been talking to Lefty? He got
to you did he? What he say? It’s lies. Lies. And let me tell you something
about Lefty. Every time he puts in his thumb he pulls out a plum. Every time.
You know what I’m saying? You hear what I’m saying?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Aaaaall right. So could you please
briefly…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Jeffcoat: Thumb wrestle.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Excuse me?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Jeffcoat: Thumb wrestle me right now. If I
win, I get the job. If I lose you let me live, but I walk out of here and you
never see me again.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: That’s not at all how the hiring
process works. We have to carefully…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Jeffcoat: Afraid, huh? Well I don’t blame
you. Not with the delicate bone structure of those hands. Kind of willowy. Not
very manly. I’d probably snap your thumb in half.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: It’s not that…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Jeffcoat: Too many years behind this desk,
I suppose. Drains the essential fluids. Maybe you were a man once, before you
started here. In the Postal we work outside. We face down sleet and duel with
Dobermans. You probably don’t even sharpen your own pencil, do you kid?
Probably got one of those electrical ones that whirs around and grinds down
your pencil just like this job has whittled <i style="mso-bidi-font-style: normal;">you</i>
down until you’re nothing but a nubbin of a man!</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: (After a pause) Dad, why do you even
want this job?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Jeffcoat: I don’t Sonny. It’s my lunchtime
and I just thought I would stop by.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: Well thanks for that.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Jeffcoat: Went all the way through security
you know. Guess I could have just jumped the fence.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: OK Dad. Could you sent in the next
person?</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Jeffcoat: Will do, Sonny. I think he came
by gyrocopter. Landed on the lawn out front. Carryin’ a black flag and a
backpack.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: OK Dad. See you at dinner on Saturday.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Jeffcoat:See you then. <span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Just don’t bring any hookers.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: OK Dad.</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Jeffcoat: And don’t get drunk and run your
car into the…</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Man: That’s It! Thumb wrestle right now,
old man!</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpMiddle">
Both: One two three four I declare a thumb
war! (Grunting as we fade out)</div>
<div class="MsoListParagraphCxSpLast">
<br /></div>
Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-24858742558752665152015-04-16T21:55:00.001-08:002015-04-16T21:55:12.573-08:00Richard Pryor the Sperm Whale<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc8e4NULall_nu2ZXIk__mqbx72CfynsQbb0paYFpcJM9VbTCdmDy8BxTcmvoLbkPhMt8SW-XNuZ-8leDSb7MtTNsLPbac_qelWvGxVptmHKUUaQJW578v_NIYmMcq0Y48xSLhiXZrbIWm/s1600/Whale.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjc8e4NULall_nu2ZXIk__mqbx72CfynsQbb0paYFpcJM9VbTCdmDy8BxTcmvoLbkPhMt8SW-XNuZ-8leDSb7MtTNsLPbac_qelWvGxVptmHKUUaQJW578v_NIYmMcq0Y48xSLhiXZrbIWm/s1600/Whale.jpg" height="240" width="320" /></a></div>
Off Kodiak's East Side Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-4386783835656650952010-12-19T15:29:00.007-09:002010-12-20T08:00:44.608-09:00I was a Geriatric Paperboy in Kodiak Alaska—and they fired me!<div style="color: #134f5c; text-align: center;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5Nxhxc3gn-6BZZJNVVDmncDMcr5WoZbvV07870dZwjuKxgE5E12gwqGCbXsdZSnC6VmJX_aGQ-tglUp1VZN8jp6g5OARIx3a62vN-0UDFXqiLDVvfT1IYsThALjpRE2jagoJI1Hj409xH/s1600/DSCF0005.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5Nxhxc3gn-6BZZJNVVDmncDMcr5WoZbvV07870dZwjuKxgE5E12gwqGCbXsdZSnC6VmJX_aGQ-tglUp1VZN8jp6g5OARIx3a62vN-0UDFXqiLDVvfT1IYsThALjpRE2jagoJI1Hj409xH/s320/DSCF0005.JPG" width="320" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_yuUs4LBiPNlvGf-1rpKoYyRKUBbwmpwN5E4ANimG_4JUlgoQb19X3IlKBs8jynYdvRFmG2TUFFQtmmX5cPvrshUXFSD0GvmY3ZfTkGAewVEAl7KvPHrFJL4MWDc5EJVq-v2SgYrnmMg2/s1600/scan0008.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEh_yuUs4LBiPNlvGf-1rpKoYyRKUBbwmpwN5E4ANimG_4JUlgoQb19X3IlKBs8jynYdvRFmG2TUFFQtmmX5cPvrshUXFSD0GvmY3ZfTkGAewVEAl7KvPHrFJL4MWDc5EJVq-v2SgYrnmMg2/s1600/scan0008.jpg" /></a></div></div><div style="color: red; text-align: center;">First off, this whole thing is Drew Herman's fault. </div><br />
It was during a fundraiser for publicradio KMXT 100.1 FM two Saturdays ago. I was covering the early morning phone shift when Drew's stylish pea-coat whisked into the newsroom. I had just finished buffing the stainless sink and chrome fixtures.Radio folk are wonderfully slovenly.<br />
<br />
"Terry Haines" he said "You are just the man to help me with a problem."<br />
"Anything I can do, Professor."<br />
"I have had a tune stuck in my head that I simply cannot identify." He hummed a fragment.<br />
“I believe that is Mendelssohn's Fifth in D Flat Major, and you can certainly bet De Major was flat after he finished Mendelssohn's fifth...”<br />
“Ah of course. I knew I could rely on you.”<br />
<br />
Drew is a local writer of many talents (he recently aced the listener quiz on “Performance Today”.) I discovered he was, among his capacities, a Paperboy . I was intrigued. I get fidgety between fishing seasons. <br />
“Paperboy, huh? That sounds like fun. How do you get that?” <br />
<br />
“It is simple enough. Just go into the office and inquire with Janet.” I resolved to do just that.<br />
<div style="text-align: center;"><br />
</div><div style="text-align: center;">Poor Janet. I would go on to make her life a living hell.</div><br />
Two days later I was the proud Paperboy of two routes: Three Sisters and Bell's Flats. My wife was incredulous. <br />
“So you took the two worst paper routes in the northern hemisphere, they are thirty miles apart and it's the dead of winter?”<br />
“I'm just trying to help out.”<br />
“You could help me out. What about the list on the refrigerator?”<br />
“I plan to do that stuff between 3 and 5 AM while I listen to the BBC.”<br />
<br />
She shook her head and walked away as I prepped the Jeep for arctic travel. My routes were the coldest this side of Iceland: down the precipitous curving iceways of Three Sisters, and in the wide dark valley known locally as “The Flats.”<br />
<br />
Three Sisters is five miles or so north of Kodiak City. It is comprised of a handful of forking dirt roads, paved with ice at this time of year, that wind down a patch of the woody rocky coastline above Monashka Bay seeking out the nooks and cornices where tight little cabins are sometimes built side by side with wide windowed Alaska mansions. It is not a walking route. Ice covers the long sloping driveways like poured glass. I delivered 17 wafer thin newspapers, skillfully engine braking, dodging around dogs and goats and between spruce trees.<br />
<br />
It is only after I headed out to the Flats--- through town and up to Dead Man's Corner, past the airport and the Coast Guard Base and around Woman's Bay,( the ruts in the ice holding the Jeep on the road through forty mile gusts of northwest wind,) that it occured to me: there is no way to make a cent on these routes—its just too much gas.<br />
At nearly four bucks a gallon I am delivering forty two 50cent newspapers at a fuel cost of ten dollars per day.<br />
<br />
The math was not lost on my wife.<br />
“So they are paying you 120 dollars a month, and it will cost you two hundred in gas to deliver them.”<br />
“I think I could break even in Three Sisters if I double the readership. I have big plans to go door to door...”<br />
“Fine. But you can't drive out to the Flats everyday on your own dime.”<br />
<br />
So the next day I told Janet I would like to keep the Three Sisters route but explained that I couldn't drive out to the Flats anymore, for reasons of domestic tranquility.<br />
<br />
“But” she said “you signed The Contract.”<br />
<br />
“I know” I said, smirking slightly, “and I certainly would not want to default on my paperboy contract but I just can't go out to the Flats anymore. I have big plans to expand readership at Three Sis...”<br />
<br />
“But” she said “you signed The Contract.”<br />
<br />
A chill raised the hairs on the back of my neck and I wondered if I should have read The Contract before signing it. It did have remarkable heft for a document designed for fourteen year olds, and perhaps the cracked leather binding and the fact that I was required to ink my name in blood should have been red flags as well.<br />
<br />
“Well” I said, after an awkward pause, “I was talking to a friend of a friend about taking over the Flats. I'll talk to her again. Oh and I can't deliver papers on Thursday and Friday. I have to go to Anchorage to yell at the federal Fisheries Management Council and be on TV.”<br />
Janet just raised a bemused eyebrow, but I seemed to hear demon voices keening low from somewhere down the long hallway. Chuckling nervously I grabbed my bundle and jumped into the Jeep. I delivered all of them even the Bell's Flats route, telling myself I would do the right thing and find a replacement on Monday.”<br />
In Anchorage I instruct the North Pacific Fisheries Management Council on ways they can fix their errant policies. I feel confident they will listen this time. I was also very happily cranky as part of a panel segment of “Moore Up North” with that Alaska treasure Shannyn Moore.<br />
<br />
Monday back in Kodiak saw me less than thrilled about my new paper route.<br />
“I'm tired from all the mental engagement.” I told my wife. <br />
“Not from the fact finding missions at Humpy's and Darwin's Theory?”<br />
“And the Taproot. That place is great. Alright”. I struggled off the couch and to the Jeep. But I obviously needed to earn some gas money. I called Seamus. They had a couple of skates that need stripping and sticking. Sweet. I figured I would go down to the boat harbor tomorrow and knock out a couple before my route.<br />
<br />
At the newspaper office I miss Janet who is out delivering another route. This pattern would continue. Each day I would come in with Janet out, tell them I couldn't deliver to the Flats anymore. And take the papers anyway. I only realized later that I was doing the Dread Pirate Robert's technique: “Well goodnight Wesley, most likely kill you in the morning.”<br />
<br />
Then on Wednesday two things happened: My friend offered me a fishing job and I met The Publisher.<br />
<br />
I was down on Seamus' boat working on my skate (I only ended up finishing one, but engaged in some great conversations regarding human nature and the function of faith). The wind was gusting pretty hard so I decided to check the lines of a friend's boat before lunch. On the way down the float I ran into a cod job.<br />
<br />
Now there is a little man in my head who sits on a stool in front of a big red button listening for my ears to hear the words “Do you want to go fishing?” His only job is to lean forward and slam that button when he hears that magic question.<br />
“Yes I do.” My mouth says automatically.<br />
Ah Ha! Heavens be praised! A real job, with water underfoot and the shoreline a safe distance away! But what about The Contract? What fell fate awaited me if I broke it?<br />
Nervous eyeballs regarded me at the newspaper office as I gave my daily renunciation of the Flats route. “I can't keep sneaking out to the Flats this way.” I joked. “My wife thinks I'm having an affair. “<br />
<br />
I sensed there was something different. A presence. Then a figure glided out of the shadows like Fu Manchu from a forties film noir. <br />
“I am Richard.” he said, “the Publisher.”<br />
“Terry the Paperboy” I shook his hand. It crackled with static power.<br />
“What would it take to induce you to keep taking papers to the Flats known commonly as Bell's?”<br />
“Well,” I said “it seems to me that if you are already sending a truck out there to deliver to the store you could just give your carrier gas money and have him do it. That way you don't have to send it separately and the carrier wouldn't have to worry about gas wiping out his meager profits.” Now I realize this was a bit disingenuous of me, knowing I would have to go cod fishing next week anyway. But I thought this would work better for the next carrier anyway, and be more efficient for the paper.<br />
<br />
I'm helping out.<br />
<br />
The Publisher pounded the keys on a steam powered calculator and announced a fairly reasonable number. Great. I would call my friend's friend and tell her to come to the news office and grab the Flat's route- she wouldn't have my gas worries, making it a much better job.<br />
Friday saw me doing my last deliveries in the Flats. It was five o'clock: rather late-- I had taken my herd of corgis for a walk to the top of pillar Mountain first. I felt good. The cold sunset was shining through the ice fog and the Flats were glowing in a surreal light. Now all I had to do was find a substitute for the Three Sisters route. I was still exited about expanding the...<br />
My cell phone rang. It was Janet. She sounded tired. I realized that I had been little more than a headachy question mark for her. The good news was my friend's friend would start Monday. But I did not need to worry about Three Sisters anymore either. I had broken The Contract.<br />
“You mean I'm fired from my paperboy job?”<br />
I flipped the phone shut and thought “Oh thank God.” I had one more stop- a lady who hadn't received her paper for a couple of days even though I was sure I had delivered it. I knocked on her door and she answered in her bathrobe. Darn it. I hate answering my door in my robe. She seemed irritated. I tell her I'm sorry she hasn't got her paper and ask if I'd left it in the right place. It seems I did. I don't get it.<br />
“Well I'm very sorry Ma'am. Here are those papers, and today's”<br />
“That's OK”. She says, her face softening “Merry Christmas.”<br />
“Thanks. Merry Christmas to you, too.” I smiled. That was the best tip I got.<br />
<br />
<br />
<br />
Copyright—Terry Haines 2010Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-8203381712861988152010-03-20T08:26:00.005-08:002010-03-27T21:41:08.678-08:00<meta equiv="CONTENT-TYPE" content="text/html; charset=utf-8"><title></title><meta name="GENERATOR" content="OpenOffice.org 3.2 (Win32)"><style type="text/css"> <!-- @page { margin: 0.79in } P { margin-bottom: 0.08in } A:link { so-language: zxx } --> </style> <p style="line-height: 115%;" align="CENTER"><span style="color:#1f497d;"><span style="font-size: 16pt;font-size:130%;" ><b>I was sitting next to Satan at the BnB </b></span></span> </p> <p style="line-height: 115%;" align="CENTER"><span style="color:#1f497d;"><span style="font-size: 16pt;font-size:130%;" ><b>in Kodiak in the winter of 1992</b></span></span></p> <p style="line-height: 115%;" align="CENTER"><span style="color:#1f497d;"> <span style="font-size: 16pt;font-size:130%;" ><b>when those two federal agents fell through the front door.</b></span></span></p> <p> That was their first mistake: always enter the BnB through the side door. </p> <p><span style="font-style: normal;">Satan was spinning a quarter on the bar and a</span> williwaw whirled across the street. The tiny tornado snatched up slate dust and coffee cups and crows as it rose up behind the feds and shoved them through the doorway. Their awkward entrance caused one of them to jostle the elbow of the dangerously crystallized Crabber Mike as he was lining up a shot on the eight ball. </p> <p>The quarter hummed and jumped and seemed solid as it settled into a saddle in the red mahogany. The Devil arched his eyebrow and smiled like the Yukon border: long and cold and crooked. I knew those federal boys were in for a whole lot of trouble.</p> <p>“Why don’t you just leave those fellas be?’ I asked.</p> <p>“Oh you know me.” Said Satan, sipping his Sauza as he tipped his head toward them, “It’s <u>you</u> they‘re looking for, of course.” The corner of his smile poked me in the ribs.</p> <p>“I know.” I said, pulling the Tilley hat down over my eyes, “I know.”</p> <p>Satan scooted down as the agents approached. They sat on either side of me. I slumped over my liquid sunshine.</p> <p>“You Terry?”</p> <p>I sat up. “Yes I am. And you are?” I stuck out my hand.</p> <p>“Ahm.” He shook my hand- <span style="font-style: normal;"> soft and droopy.</span> “I am Agent Breitz. This is Agent Dobromowitz. ” Red lettered FBI badges flopped open. Behind us we heard a short laugh, a cry of alarm and the sound of a sack of potatoes hitting the floor from a height of three feet.</p> <p>“Two Liquid Sunshines for Cool Breeze and Dobro, please Bernie.”</p> <p>“No beers sir. This is official business.” he waved off Bernie who went on filling the pints anyway.</p> <p>Crabber Mike, who had been looming, stepped up. “Who's your friends, Terry?”</p> <p>“Oh- Crabber Mike, this Is Cool Breeze and this is Dobro.”</p> <p>“You.” He pointed a kielbasa sized finger at Agent Dobromowitz “You made me miss.”</p> <p>“Maybe you two should play a game” I suggested. “Looks like Louie's taking a break.” Louie was laying on the floor. His hat was a couple of feet away. </p> <p>“Go ahead Tom.” Agent Breitz handed his partner the pint of Sunshine. “Blend in. But be on your guard.” He looked around the dark old bar- (not much more than a converted cabin, really)- “There is something about this place...” His eyes rested momentarily on the Devil. “Something...” He took a slug of the Sunshine. Crabber Mike seemed to smile behind his impenetrable blond beard which run high up his red cheeks like wild salmonberry bushes. He even has a streak of blond hair that runs across the bridge of his nose and reaches up for his eyebrows. </p> <p>“Terry." Agent Breitz turned to me.</p> <p>“Yes?”</p> <p>”You are not an easy person to put your finger on in a town of only six thousand residents, and that is saying something, considering our training and resources. Everywhere we went you had just left.”</p> <p>It was true. My crabber senses had been making me move all day. I didn't know what was making them go off, but when I saw Satan sitting at the B holding an icy Bloody Mary to his forehead I just sat next to him and waited. When you see Satan you may as well walk right up to him. The Devil is, if anything, more dangerous from a distance. One Sunshine later the FBI was sniffing up the stairway.</p> <p>Why me? What did I do?</p> <p> Did they know about the doorway under my house? That Pillar mountain was a spongecake of secret tunnels and chambers, chock full of whacked out delusional nutjobs with bears and blowtorches and massive Tesla coils? That ghosts of whalers and longliners past sat at the bar beside us??</p> <p>“You were born, were you not, at Bunker Hill Air Force Base in Peru, Indiana?”</p> <p>“Yeah...my Dad was in the Air Force.”</p> <p>“Your parents were unwitting participants in a genetic manipulation experiment. In 1961 the Department of Defense embarked on a program using irradiated prune juice and a specially designed forceps in an attempt to create a supersoldier. You are the result.” </p> <p>“I'm a Supersoldier?”</p> <p>“No. The experiment was a spectacular failure and a humiliating black stain on the nation's entire secret genetic manipulation program, sadly. </p> <p>You see, scientists had long been aware that certain individuals have “Rainman” type abilities: fantastic cognitive and memory powers<span style="font-style: normal;"> combined with a fractured and asocial mentality.</span> We hoped <span style="font-style: normal;">select</span> American children could be <span style="font-style: normal;">carefully damaged</span> to create the perfect soldier: ruthless, relentless and with a computer like ability to remember mission parameters and details as well as rules of engagement, ahhh anniversaries, phone numbers...”</p> <p>“I'm a Super Rolodex?”</p> <p>“No. One by one the participants have all died in remarkably stupid ways. Number Four stepped in front of a bus while buttering a bagel. Number thirty two simply forgot he was in the bathtub. Etcetera.” </p> <p>“I'm a Super moron?”</p> <p>“Yes. The only remarkable thing about you is that you are still alive. However, since the government has spent so much time and effort on you we have decided to present you with a unique opportunity to serve your country.</p> <p>Satan elbowed me. Crabber Mike was physically pouring a shot of Jagermeister down Dobro's throat.</p> <p> </p> <p>Over the years Satan and I have gotten pretty well acquainted, I’m sorry to say. </p> <p>And I’m not going to tell you he’s misunderstood. He’s understood pretty well, actually, except for the part about the souls.</p> <p> And the part about who he is and where he came from.</p> <p> But he really hates the humans. </p> <p>He despises us. </p> <p>The Angels took his wings away impossibly long ago, and the time has tightened around the Devil like a Moebius anaconda. It has crushed and swallowed him. In its belly the acid of the ages has left him stripped and diminished. He has become a shard of sharpened bone, a hard evil speck with a single flickering pilot light in his head that won't go out:</p> <p>He wants to see the human race burned down to cosmic ash and blown across the expanse of this entirely too unlikely universe. The looping and repeating laughtrack behind the human comedy has driven the Devil mad. He wants us gone, gone, gone, finally gone. And if that means he is destroyed too, along with all the Angels and everything else that ever has been, or will ever be, well, that’s OK with Mr. Scratch.</p> <p> He just wants out.</p> <p> </p> <p style="margin-left: 1.5in; line-height: 115%;"> </p> <p style="margin-left: 1.5in; line-height: 115%;"><span style="font-size: 16pt;font-size:130%;" ><b>Chapter One: Dogs Playing Poker</b></span></p> <p style="margin-left: 2in;"><i><b>Set out running but I take my time…</b></i></p> <p style="margin-left: 2in;"><i><b>A friend of the Devil is a friend of mine…</b></i></p> <p>I first met the Devil in Dutch Harbor, which may come as no surprise to anyone who has spent time on <u>that</u> island paradise. It was 1989, before the crab was rationalized and the dire one thousand were sent back to Kodiak and Seattle to gnaw through their long winter months standing on dirt. </p> Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-81531881570373512682009-07-24T09:22:00.005-08:002009-08-06T07:24:31.294-08:00City of the Future: Kodiak, Alaska<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigKYBT6EB90-bIvQU7_oL85WT72prL_VsqHC0Vkb5Kc7zETMovkcBpUgPngS_082kOBz_FcgsjNvOQie8PX1UvDgXI33jO_TWCroyNLjvyzS3PMf91tKnAHC8xoZ3c8wx8jr909o-3cR9n/s1600-h/Stanford+Pillar+Mnt.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 0pt 10px 10px; float: right; cursor: pointer; width: 400px; height: 300px;" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEigKYBT6EB90-bIvQU7_oL85WT72prL_VsqHC0Vkb5Kc7zETMovkcBpUgPngS_082kOBz_FcgsjNvOQie8PX1UvDgXI33jO_TWCroyNLjvyzS3PMf91tKnAHC8xoZ3c8wx8jr909o-3cR9n/s400/Stanford+Pillar+Mnt.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5362448225362684322" border="0" /></a><br />Mumbai? Shanghai? Pittsburgh? Which of these great cities will dominate the globe thirty years from now?<br /><br />How about Kodiak?<br /><br />Yes, Kodiak Alaska, world's most progressive city.<br />Located on the United States' second biggest island and surrounded by earth's richest waters, Kodiak is a deep water port par excellence, conveniently located outside the frying pan of the coming global meltdown.<br /><br />Speaking of which, the rapid retreat of Arctic sea ice will make for a reliable over the top trade route very possibly in the next decade. Look at a globe and you'll see Kodiak sitting midway, like a gas station in the middle of the desert. Already the home of the nation's biggest Coast Guard base and a brand new 600 ton Marine Travelift, Kodiak has two working boat harbors and facilities to accommodate container ships, jet airplanes and rocket ships. And we have our own brewery.<br /><br />Kodiak's hydroelectric and wind power generation capacities should have it at 95% renewable electricity by 2020. Add a little fish oil capacity and we could be 100% oil independant for our power needs. Take that oil-igarchy.<br /><br />And the people can't be beat. A remarkably diverse community Kodiak enjoys that camaraderie that comes from being trapped on a merciless rock together. Like inmates at Alcatraz.<br /><br />Or maybe the last cornered humans in a world overrun by zombie banks.Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-847083557187310382009-01-06T11:38:00.004-09:002009-01-15T13:56:39.479-09:00Bad Poetry Cafe, Vol. 1<div style="text-align: center; color: rgb(0, 0, 153);"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Sumo Buddha</span><br /></span></div><br /><br /><br />No direction<br />Misconception<br />A thousand points of darkness<br />Downstream on a river of pure aggression<br />Minnows into sharkness<br />What is right and who is wrong<br />Fight the fight or go along<br />Its like Buddha in the Sumo ring<br />The roaring crowd<br />Is much more loud<br />Than the choir in his head can sing.<br /><br />"Now here is life on the halfshell nut"<br />he says to himself as he's kicked in the gut<br />"Laid out languid or pinprickle fury-<br />these are my choices? (Don't call me Shirley)<br />Stinging bee and honeyed hive-<br />Its a study in contrasts just being alive"<br />Pinning his opponent with a peaceful piledriver<br />He says "You are alive<br />But I am aliver"Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-74166151840824942812009-01-02T20:20:00.007-09:002009-01-15T14:21:20.311-09:00The Jobs Americans Don't Want To Do<div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-size:130%;"><span style="font-weight: bold;">How to Lose Your Soul by Not Using Your Hands</span></span><br /><br /><div style="text-align: left;"><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);font-size:100%;" >It was 8:45 AM, March of 2008. I was slumped into a convention chair on the holo-deck of the Washington DC Hilton</span><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">, listening to a slight, scholarly lady talk about immigration policy. The morning's latte was dancing a slow waltz in my head with the ghosts of the previous evening's martinis. All around me dellow felegates from the National League of Cities' annual descent upon the nation's capitol sipped coffee or dozed under ten gallon hats as the lady, Tamar Jacoby, argued that Joe Farmer needs access to cheap foreign labor, i.e. illegal aliens.</span><br /><br />Then she said something that pulled me up in my seat. Little alarms were going off in my brain, so I looked down on my notebook to see what righty had written. Ms. Jacoby had said:<br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">"A large percentage of them work in dirty, demeaning, low paid jobs that native born Americans no longer want to do: busboys, chambermaids, farmhands, nurses' aides, sweatshop workers, on the assembly line, in meat packing plants."</span><br /><br />I shook the martini ghosts out of my head and listened. She described an America that is older and more educated, and not willing to do "unskilled work". I look down on my own rough and misshapen hands. Hmmmm.<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">She goes on to make the case that the American of tomorrow will be heady and shiny, graduating with honors along with his friends and classmates, festooned all over with gold stars and blue ribbons, comparing their trophies for participation at the mall where they consume the proper products in languidly prowling packs, waiting for the day when they will be placed in a skilled, non demeaning positions of oblique responsibility. Obviously these uber-Americans will need unskilled, uneducated foreigners to clear the plates, harvest the corndogs and empty the chamberpots.</span><br /><br />At first I thought I' was just offended by the idea of an underclass, a shadow segment of our society with a hungry belly that the rest of us rule because of their need to fill it.<br /><span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">But there's something more. We are also hurt by our own aversion to simple physical work.</span><br />This didn't really strike home to me until the recent "financial crisis" began to unwind. For years my wife has been asking me what it is Americans do, exactly. Most of us (If WalMart wages aren't sucking you into the underclass) seem to make a living providing services to other Americans. Chefs, CPAs and surgeons all charge each other enough to make a sweet living. "But if so few of us actually make anything," my wife asked "where does all the money come from?"<br />"I don't know." I replied "Maybe its the savings from all the illegal beef butchers and diaper changers."<br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">It turns out some of our most skilled and educated financiers conspired to build a house of mirrors that crashed under the weight of its own reflections. What they did to the entire world should be criminal, but instead we have chosen to open our forgiving arms and wallets to these prodigals. </span><br /><br />But the original prodigal son was contrite. Ours have flown back to Daddy unrepentant, in sleek private jets, sheepishly grinning fops with silk hankies who need a new stake after foolishly gambling away their ready cash.<span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);"> Of course Daddy is broke too, so the sharecoppers in the valley will have to pony up Junior's bailout because, after all, if he can't generously spread his money around how shall the little people survive? </span><br /><br />Well I have news for the dandies of high finance. <span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">You are the little people.</span> I know working people here in Kodiak who came from Mexico and Guatemala and the Phillipines who work their whole lives gutting fish and sorting mail who have more honor and nobility than a thousand bailout sucking CEOs. Their character is the true bedrock of our society, and it is built from dirty hands and sore backs.<br /><br />And isn't true value created by the one who catches the fish, builds the car and invests in the factory?<span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);"> That's real capitalism. </span>You work to make or do something and are paid a purchase price or wage. Then you take that money and risk it to make more. <span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">The emerging pseudo capitalism in which morbidly obese corporations are "too big to let them fail" neatly combines the worst aspects of Marxism and fascism.</span> Corpogovernment will preserve our failing businesses like Lenin's waxy corpse for the good of the people. But what should we expect from a culture that no longer values the contributions of those who actually do something? Somehow we got it backwards. <span style="color: rgb(204, 0, 0);">We seem to believe that money makes people and that character comes from strength.</span><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(0, 0, 153);">You know it is ever true that the best of us, he kindest, those with real patience and generosity seem invariably to be those who have known real hardship and adversity. If you ask me every kid in America should have to work in the sweatshop before he gets his Gap t shirt. And every financial executive who gets a bailout should carry chamberpots for lettuce pickers.</span><br /><br /><br /></div></div>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-24716899777963896812008-11-29T09:59:00.004-09:002008-11-29T10:29:07.989-09:00News Flash- Bush Will Never Pardon Ted Stevens<div align="center"><span style="font-size:180%;color:#000099;">"Bush" or the Justice Department that is made in his image, went after him in the first place</span></div><div align="center"> </div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000000;"><span style="color:#cc0000;">Scuttlebutt has always centered on a certain Native Corporation that Uncle Ted helped to get a no-bid contract to supply cell phones in Iraq.</span> The phones were second hand Fisher-Price Big Bird models that would only connect you to Elmo, or some such. At any rate <span style="color:#003300;"><span class="blsp-spelling-error" id="SPELLING_ERROR_0">Phonegate</span></span> added to a pile of embarrassing contractor scandals in Iraq, and it was one of the only ones in which Cheney wasn't involved. <span style="color:#cc0000;">Add that to Stevens' "Don't pet me, I bite." charm, and we find a Republican Mr. Bush is quite happy to see the J-Dog clamp onto..</span> Bush</span><span style="color:#003300;"> let the beast off its leash in the first place.</span></div><div align="left"> </div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000099;">So don't look for a Presidential pardon for Uncle Ted. W. has himself to worry about.</span></div><div align="left"> </div><div align="left">A complete look at the pillaging of both Iraq and the US taxpayer by contractors and their <span class="blsp-spelling-corrected" id="SPELLING_ERROR_1">Congressional</span> enablers, including Ted's Big Cell Phone Adventure:</div><div align="left"> </div><div align="left"><a href="http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0PBZ/is_6_86/ai_n27084061?tag=rel.res1">http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0PBZ/is_6_86/ai_n27084061?tag=rel.res1</a></div>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-30872159084599762872008-11-18T08:34:00.008-09:002008-11-26T11:54:32.499-09:00The Sword Over Bristol Bay's Head<p><strong>A corporation is a one eyed slobbering beast that will chase a dollar over a cliff. Sure, they have their uses, like the trolls in the Lord of the Rings. But you should not put them in charge of long term planning..</strong></p><br /><p><span style="color:#000099;">Case in point: the impending ruination of the vast watershed that feeds the Bristol Bay.</span></p><br /><p><span style="color:#003300;">Alaskans failed to pass a referendum this year that would have simply required mines to not poison groundwater.</span> As a result a lake of poisonous sludge held back by one of the earth's biggest dams will be poised at the headwaters of the Kvichak, keystone river of the Bristol Bay red salmon run, so that the Pebble Miners can dig one of the biggest holes in the world. (Click illustration at bottom)</p><br /><p><span style="color:#003300;">Now the BLM has decided to open a million acres of the wide river drainage downstream</span>, effectively tearing down the last fences that protect a run of fish that is perhaps the world's most fantastic renewable resource. Millions of pounds of the finest food imaginable comes back every year, unless we poison them, which, apparently, we will. (Click story below)</p><p><span style="color:#000099;">I grew up in California's Sacramento River valley. One hundred years ago they were where Bristol Bay is now. Mining moved in on a salmon run that filled the rivers. After a couple of dams and a whole lot of extraction the fish are down to a trickle. Today, after Herculean effort, the winter run of king salmon on the Sacramento river is finally coming out of single digits, at an expense to the taxpayer of forty thousand dollars per fish. (Click story below)</span></p><p><br /><span style="color:#cc0000;">Ah, yes, the Iron Mountain Mine</span>. Like Pebble, it was seen as an economic boon to the region. They dug deep into the rocky hills at the headwaters of the Keswick. <span style="color:#cc0000;">Today, even as we speak, it is exuding a smoking acidy poison that defies description. </span>It may never stop leaking out, not in human memory. The strange bacteria that survive there have been used by scientists to show <span style="color:#000099;">that life might exist on other planets, where "life as we know it" could not.</span></p><p><span style="color:#000099;">Will we learn from the past, or just grunt, put our heads down, and follow that dollar?</span> </p><br /><br /><p><a href="http://www.adn.com/money/story/592844.html">http://www.adn.com/money/story/592844.html</a></p><p><a href="http://www.earthjustice.org/library/references/sacbee_winter_run_salmon.pdf">http://www.earthjustice.org/library/references/sacbee_winter_run_salmon.pdf</a><br /><br /><a href="http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/specials/mining/26996_damage12.shtml">http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/specials/mining/26996_damage12.shtml</a><br /></p>Here's a chart of the area, courtesy of the Anchorage Daily News:<br /><br /><br /><a href="http://community.adn.com/mini_apps/assetDisplay/?ref=http://media.adn.com/smedia/2008/11/18/00/505-18BLM_BristolBay.graphic_large.prod_affiliate.7.gif&summ=&sec=171&width=528&height=568">http://community.adn.com/mini_apps/assetDisplay/?ref=http://media.adn.com/smedia/2008/11/18/00/505-18BLM_BristolBay.graphic_large.prod_affiliate.7.gif&summ=&sec=171&width=528&height=568</a>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-8535539604192322442008-11-10T09:59:00.002-09:002008-11-10T10:09:43.853-09:00Senator Elton Says It All<div align="center"><strong><span style="color:#000099;">I was going to blog rhapsodic on how much Alaska's political circumstances have suffered since our Governor's recent tour throwing gravel encrusted slushballs at every one who is now in power in Washington DC.</span></strong> </div><div align="center"> </div>But Alaska's State Senator Kim Elton has already written it, much better than I could. Link on the piece below for a thoughtful look at our new reality:<br /><br /><a href="http://alaskareport.com/news1108/x61752_elton_different.htm">http://alaskareport.com/news1108/x61752_elton_different.htm</a>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-3020610204833718342008-11-07T09:09:00.003-09:002008-11-07T09:30:10.556-09:00Crab Ratz Problems Well Known Before Implementation<div align="center"><span style="color:#000099;">Almost Five Years Ago---The Northern Fish Council Ignored Working Fishermen Then, Too</span></div><div align="center"><span style="color:#000099;"></span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;">Here is the naively worded testimony I provided the North Pacific Fisheries Management Council in early 2004, before implementation of Crab Ratz. The fact that none of the socially destructive aspects of Crab Ratz have been addressed to this day is a sad commentary itself.</span></div><div align="left"></div><div align="center"><span style="color:#cc0000;">North Pacific Fisheries Management Council </span></div><div align="center"><span style="color:#cc0000;">Re: BUY BACK MY BACK</span></div><div align="left"><br />First of all, I would like to thank you, the North Pacific Fisheries Management council, for waking me up. I had been asleep, and the cold bucket of water that was your crab rationalization plan left me blinking, sputtering, and drenched in outrage.</div><div align="left"><br /><span style="color:#000099;">Because, to me, the rationalization behind rationalization isn’t rational.</span> As a guy who first crabbed in 1984, who has banged and shoveled many tons of salt water ice, hooked and pulled through thousands of buoy setups, pushed, tied and clambered over hundreds of stacks of pots, and dealt on a personal basis with processors, skippers and boat owners, I felt I might be in a position to point out certain errors in the plan’s most basic logical underpinnings. </div><div align="left"></div><div align="left">To wit:<br /><span style="color:#000099;">The awarding of permanent buying privileges to a limited number of processors is not justified. </span><span style="color:#000066;">If the vessel buyback program is sufficient compensation for the overcapitalization of boat owners, then a similar one time buyback program should suffice for the overcapitalization of processors.</span> To step into the arena of the giving and taking away of freedoms, rights and privileges in a free society should not be the job of the Council, only the management of fisheries. To award buyer’s privileges to these entities is, I think, best understood in terms of the stripping the right of everyone else to buy fish. To extend this thinking logically everyone in the industry should be frozen in place, from cannery workers to deckhands, skippers and owners. Is it the intent of the Council to create a permanent caste system? I don’t think it is, so the Council must reconsider this awarding of the market to an anointed few. </div><div align="left">Since the days of the daring Dutchmen in what was then New Amsterdam, free trade has been the engine that powers America. To create Lords of Commerce in the fishing industry is to apply a medieval solution to a modern problem. The Justice Department has numerous reservations about Processor Shares and has predicted a sticky goo of lawsuits. I must concur.</div><div align="left"><br /><span style="color:#000066;">The elimination of consideration for crew, and the minimal consideration offered to skippers is not justified. Every argument offered to support the awarding of shares to processors applies to skippers and crew, who pay, on average, 40% of a boats daily operating expenses plus the cost of their own equipment, and the investment of many hours of labor, for what is only a chance to make money.</span> If they were wage earners, with the owners taking all the risk, making all the investment, and therefore taking all the profit, there would be no claim. But they aren’t. <span style="color:#000066;">Fishing is a venture, undertaken by contractually linked businessmen, three quarters of which are skippers and crew. </span>The Justice Department hasn’t studied this aspect of rationalization, but surely a similar sticky goo of lawsuits is lurking in the wings for this, too.</div><div align="left"><br />I’m an old man, nearly 43, and I thought the sight of me, bent over my cane as I shuffle painfully up the long stairways to attend the meetings might engender a sympathetic ear on the part of the Council. What I have come to learn is that the North Pacific Fisheries Management Council is not so much a forum of the minds as an advocacy platform. In its well meaning desire to defer to the wishes and concerns of the industry, the Council has formed policy based on the interests of those groups most forcefully represented in the hallways, at the breakfast tables, and in the seats of the Council itself. </div><div align="left"><br />I expected to find fire breathing dragons and evil wizards at work when I first began attending Council meetings. To my surprise I spoke to a continuous stream of pleasant, intelligent, engaging people who were doing nothing more or less than their jobs, which was to represent their own interests and those of their employers. Processors, well-informed, well-funded, and well represented on the Council, mounted an impressive campaign, and are now a driving force in the process. Fledgling Skipper/Crew groups like the Gulf Groundfish Fisherman’s Association, the Crewman’s Association and the swelling Deep Sea Fisherman’s Union will probably grow up too late to join the big boys on the field before the game is over.</div><div align="left"><br />Still, the potential for backlash is enormous. Every lawsuit, every protest, every disparate group with an axe to grind at the Council’s table has the potential to further slow a process that can be tracked by counting the rings in its trunk. I therefore suggest these two changes: </div><div align="left"><br />1. That the number of processors allowed to buy fish in Alaska not be limited. A simple buyback program, in which excess processors would be bought out by those remaining, would be better still.</div><div align="left"><br />2. That a “Buy Back My Back” program be implemented to compensate long term participants in the industry:<br />A long term participant is defined as a skipper or crewman who fulfils his/her full seasonal contractual obligations.<br />The fund would have two tiers: one for Skipper/Crew participants during the qualifying IFQ years, and one for ongoing participants in the rationalized fishery.<br /><br />Qualifying participants in the first tier would be assigned one point for each of the IFQ qualifying years in which he fulfils his contractual obligation. Acknowledging that Skipper/Crew often move from boat to boat while requiring contractual fulfillment for qualification recognizes the fluid nature of skipper/crew employment dynamic, while also recognizing the importance of dependable professionals. Qualified participants would receive a one time payment, amount depending on number of points, funded in a way similar to the vessel buyback program. This purpose of this payment would be to enable excess Skipper/Crew to leave the industry, or for those wishing to remain to buy into the industry.</div><div align="left"><br />The second tier would be comprised of present day contracted skipper/crew. Upon fulfilling his seasonal contract, he would be signed off by the boat owner and would receive a yearly dividend. The creation of a subsidized health insurance program as an alternate to a dividend could best bring permanent long term benefits to the community of fishers. </div><div align="left"><br />Such a program would address issues of equitable distribution of the resource to all stakeholders in the industry as well as fostering a stable, professional pool of contractors for the industry. I strongly urge that these changes be seriously considered as you refine the alternatives for GOA Groundfish and implement the BSAI crab rationalization plan.</div><div align="left"><br />I’m sorry I won’t be able to join you for this meeting. I know you’ll miss me. Right now I smell so strongly of squid juice that the automatic doors at Safeway open 25 feet before I arrive. I therefore officially support the efforts of Mr. Kwatchka of the GGFA, Mr. Soma of the DSFU, and the testimony supplied by Mr. Branson of the Crewman’s Association.<br />Thank You, Terry Haines </div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#cc0000;">Almost five years ago, and the same issues sit on the table while our fishing communities suffer.</span></div>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-80862157402209459852008-11-05T07:35:00.008-09:002008-11-05T10:58:28.344-09:00The Red Faced State<div align="center"><span style="font-size:180%;color:#cc0000;">Alaska Says: "No We Can't!"</span></div><br /><div align="center"><span style="font-size:180%;color:#cc0000;"></span></div><br /><div align="left"><span style="color:#000000;"><span style="color:#000099;">It turns out Don Young is right. Alaskans are the dumbest people on the planet.</span> </span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000000;">And Mr. Young is going back to Washington.</span></div><div align="left"> </div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;">McCain/Palin also easily carried the state, even though the twitchy Mr. McCain often seemed more like a contestant on "Deal or No Deal" than potential commander in chief, especially when he opened the Sarah Palin briefcase. And Mrs. Palin, who seemed to be doing a fine job as governor, didn't seem very presidential lying on the canvas at the feet of the pixieish Katie Couric. </span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;"></span> </div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000099;">McCain/Palin employed the classic Republican 72 hour blitz strategy.</span><span style="color:#cc0000;"> Knowing that the opposition has little time to respond, the candidate saves the most outrageous and gut wrenching ads for the three days just before the election.</span><span style="color:#000066;"> But, to his credit, I think Annakin McCain was conflicted to the end, and seemed to hold back the worst dogs in his kennel. </span><span style="color:#cc0000;">Mrs. Palin certainly chaffed at her restraints. Alaska's rogue diva whipped chanting and booing crowds into a foamy frenzied meringue that now amounts to a national fan club.</span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#cc0000;"></span> </div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;">Mrs. Palin has come to to relish the roar of the crowds, and is less conflicted. She will come back to Wasilla not a lame duck, but a restless one.</span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;"></span> </div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000099;"><span style="color:#cc0000;">Don Young's 72 hour blitz was more effective. "I know Alaska." the grizzled grump said, and I guess he's right.</span> </span><span style="color:#000000;">Bombing the voters with a last minute ad campaign that claimed Berkowitz would immediately institute a 190 percent tax increase and become Nancy Pelosi's butler, the old warhorse has cruised over the finish line buoyed by the flow of panicking sheep.</span></div><div align="left"> </div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000000;"></span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#cc0000;">Mr. Young's problem is in two years he has to do it all over again.</span> <span style="color:#003300;">As he continues to channel hundreds of thousands of dollars of campaign contributions to DC lawyers, desperately challenging a sea of Justice Department evidence line by line, he has to be wondering if the contributions can keep up.</span> He is no longer chairman of anything, and many Republicans resent the King of Earmarks for tarnishing the brand. </div><div align="left"> </div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#cc0000;">Maybe its right that Young and Stevens return to Washington to face their peers and the prosecutors and the press. But its not good for Alaska.</span> The Senate majority leader has promised ethics hearings for Mr. Stevens, should he return, and even senior Republicans are predicting he would be booted out. In that case a special election will be held to replace him. </div><div align="left"> </div><div align="left"></div><div align="center">Now hang on. </div><div align="center"> </div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000066;">I know Mrs. Palin can't appoint herself as Uncle Ted's successor, but surely she can run for it in the special election. </span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000066;"></span></div><div align="center"><span style="font-family:georgia;font-size:180%;color:#cc0000;">Senator Sarah?</span><br /></div>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-43812798616973192102008-10-30T09:09:00.006-08:002008-10-30T11:07:06.076-08:00"I am Oz the Um, Great and Uh...Powerful..."<strong><span style="font-size:130%;">How many of the citizens of Oz wanted to lynch Dorothy when she pulled down the curtain and exposed the Wizard?</span></strong><br /><strong><span style="font-size:130%;"></span></strong><br /><span style="color:#000000;"><strong>Let's face it, the illusion had been working pretty well.</strong></span><br /><span style="color:#000099;"></span><br /><span style="color:#003300;">Here in Alaska Palin the Great and Powerful had the people praising her and the Legislature on a leash.</span> <span style="color:#000099;">Likewise, Uncle Ted, the Wizard of Washington, conjured up golden earmarks for the grateful peasants. </span><br /><span style="color:#000099;"></span><br />These days there is a definite mood of Dorothy hatred wafting through the state.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">Did we really want to know</span> about the governor's efforts to sell herself nationally using an east coast PR firm, paid for by the state? Or that she has charged Alaska a daily fee to work from home? Or that she charged the state to fly her kids around with her to events and put them up in hotels so they could act in "official capacity" such as drawing a raffle ticket, and sometimes just popping up with kids in tow, like that friend who obliviously shows up at an adult party with her children: "Hi! What do you have for the kids to do?"<br /><br />No. Nobody really wants to know about that stuff, and its embarrassing that the whole world knows, too. Its hard to not resent the McCain campaign for luring her out into the spotlight.<br /><span style="color:#000099;">On the other hand truth is good.</span> A big wave is going to roll through Alaska politics, and we will see which boats stay afloat.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">Uncle Ted's troubles amount to a second wave of change.</span> He has pointed an angry finger his prosecutorial Dorothys for their bumbling, and some foolish minor obfuscation. <span style="color:#003300;">But even if you judge the case by what uncle Ted himself admitted on the witness stand, well, let's face it, he accepted gifts and merchandise and did not write them down on the form. Case closed. </span><br /><span style="color:#003300;"></span><br />Even if reelected he will return to the US Senate nicked as no Senator before him, to a Democratic controlled Congress and a fractured Republican minority that has largely turned its back to him.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">Hopefully the majority of the electorate will see the wisdom of sending Begich in. The old quarterback has had his day, and taken too many hits lately.</span><br /><a href="http://www.slate.com/id/2203348/">http://www.slate.com/id/2203348/</a><br /><a href="http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081021/ap_on_el_pr/palin_family_travel">http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081021/ap_on_el_pr/palin_family_travel</a>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-27624736563366387262008-10-28T08:24:00.005-08:002008-10-28T10:42:14.349-08:00Good News! The Rest of the World is Even More Screwed Up Than Us!<div align="center"><span style="font-size:130%;color:#000099;">Dollar Steers World Economy into Telephone Pole--</span></div><div align="center"><span style="font-size:130%;color:#000099;">But Is Only One Wearing Seat Belt</span></div><div align="center"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000000;"><span style="color:#cc0000;">Don't start converting to euros yet.</span> </span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000000;">In an ironic twist to the global financial crisis it looks like the the good old greenback is back on top. </span><span style="color:#cc0000;"><span style="color:#000099;">We got the world hooked on bindles of high risk head rush real estate derivatives. </span>But now that the inevitable telephone pole of reality has jumped in front of the car we have our financial Betty Ford Clinics already built. The rest of the world does not.</span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#cc0000;"></span> </div><div align="left"><span style="color:#cc0000;"></span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000099;">We've been there before.</span> FDR and friends had to nurse the financial system back after it had gotten way too high and crashed hard in 1929. The first couple of tough love years that followed saw a third of Americans lose the money in their bank accounts and a 25% unemployment rate. <span style="color:#000099;">Like today's Europe and Asia they had no net.</span> The FDIC and other "socialist" institutions FDR built to dry out a wasted economy are still in place, thankfully. <span style="color:#000099;">But the rules that hold the European Union together specifically restrict the kind of emergency "injections" we are giving our junkie banks right now.</span> Their Ad Hoc solutions directly challenge the system which is the basis of their currency. And Asian markets are still learning how to drive the capitalism car out of a ditch. <span style="color:#000099;">Once again everyone wants dollars.</span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000099;"></span> </div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000099;">So we are saved by our own schizophrenia.</span> We tossed out all the rules so we could snort up all the subprime mortgages we wanted, but we never moved out of Mom's house, so she can clean us up and put us back on our feet now that we smashed up the family car. But where does that leave us? <span style="color:#000099;">Do we go right back on a bender as soon as our strength returns, or stay safe in Mommy's arms?</span></div><div align="left"> </div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#cc0000;">Greenspan the freemarketeer is humbled now. It turns out you do need some rules after all. And Galbraith the "socialist" is correct to point out that our system of "wealth distribution" is the net that will save us from 1930 happening all over again. But let's hope the bailout doesn't turn us into a lockdown economy, with federal intervention at every step. And let's hope we learned, along with Greenie, that even a free market needs some rules.</span></div><span style="color:#cc0000;"></span><br /><a href="http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/10242008/transcript2.html">http://www.pbs.org/moyers/journal/10242008/transcript2.html</a><br /><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/24/business/economy/24panel.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin">http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/24/business/economy/24panel.html?_r=1&hp&oref=slogin</a><br /><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/05/business/worldbusiness/05euro.html">http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/05/business/worldbusiness/05euro.html</a><br /><a href="http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aF6npULt3NT8&refer=home">http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aF6npULt3NT8&refer=home</a>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-91448335124808515132008-10-27T09:41:00.002-08:002008-10-27T09:45:26.351-08:00Details of the Halibut Split<div align="center"><span style="font-size:180%;color:#cc0000;">Charter Gets Capped and Triggered</span></div><div align="left"><strong><span style="color:#000000;">Here is the link to the NPFMC Newsletter explaining the new caps on charter halibut catches in areas 2C and 3A.</span></strong></div><div align="left"><strong></strong> </div><div align="left">Scuttlebutt says it will be challenged in court.</div><div align="left"> </div><div align="left"><a href="http://www.fakr.noaa.gov/npfmc/newsletters/NEWS1008.pdf">http://www.fakr.noaa.gov/npfmc/newsletters/NEWS1008.pdf</a></div>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-62691141943944439162008-10-21T05:04:00.009-08:002008-10-30T09:07:00.548-08:00Joe Sixpack Hates Commies<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju1f_SkCrMWx1cAwdEl8dPf9lc_PJhL0lkHmARnhs3-nsimVG9mwAl4IAVM503ngQqO3b1zg33LDtOQ9BPG5BcH54zxOfBdpUEJw3JgQ7zlFRqG2y9cTAct60eBRaPVVeJ6kqyU7_V8xRZ/s1600-h/Joe+Sixpack.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5259620533346708994" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEju1f_SkCrMWx1cAwdEl8dPf9lc_PJhL0lkHmARnhs3-nsimVG9mwAl4IAVM503ngQqO3b1zg33LDtOQ9BPG5BcH54zxOfBdpUEJw3JgQ7zlFRqG2y9cTAct60eBRaPVVeJ6kqyU7_V8xRZ/s400/Joe+Sixpack.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><div><span style="color:#000066;">The McCain/Palin campaign is furiously pressing <span style="color:#cc0000;">hotbuttons</span> now, trying to get voters to turn off their brains and run to the polls with a fire in their guts.</span></div><br /><div></div><br /><div>Last week they hammered on one of mine: <span style="color:#cc0000;">"redistribution of wealth".</span> This week they added two more to the stump speeches: <span style="color:#000066;">"socialism"</span> and <span style="color:#000066;">"welfare state".</span> <span style="color:#003300;">They know very well that free market yee-hah John Wayne capitalists like me hate and fear those words and the intrusive and expensively bureaucratic European style government they bring to mind.</span></div><br /><div></div><br /><div><span style="color:#cc0000;">But of course that's not what we're talking about.</span> <span style="color:#003300;">Obama </span>is in favor of rescinding the Bush era tax cuts for the more successful among us, and would in fact give a tax cut to the other ninety five percent. <span style="color:#006600;">McCain</span> has described this shifting of the tax burden as redistribution of wealth. But neither like to talk about the real point:</div><br /><div></div><br /><div><span style="color:#cc0000;">We're broke, baby.</span></div><br /><div></div><br /><div>It's not about a fair and equitable tax rate that allows all Americans to prosper and does not punish success. We all want that. <span style="color:#000066;">It's about the fact that the United States of America is mind bogglingly deep in debt </span>and if we can't start paying some of it down China is gonna send someone over to repossess the country.</div><br /><div></div><br /><div><span style="color:#000066;">And the simple truth is the "middle class"--</span> neck deep in charge card debt, with their retirement suddenly shrunken and kids in college on credit, <span style="color:#000066;">is pretty well squeezed out.</span> <span style="color:#000000;">Its not that we wouldn't like to get more out of them.</span><span style="color:#003300;"> But Joe Sixpack is as broke as the government.</span></div><br /><div><span style="color:#cc0000;"></span></div><br /><div><span style="color:#cc0000;">And, I can't help but think that we just bailed out the millionaires when they needed help.</span> <span style="color:#000066;">The USA needs a bailout now. Maybe if Exxon Mobil and Bill Gates would take a just little less in tax cuts America's stock could rise too. </span></div><br /><div><span style="color:#000066;"></span></div><a href="http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/10/18/18545332.php">http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2008/10/18/18545332.php</a><br /><div></div>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-89729156487516623392008-10-18T08:56:00.007-08:002008-10-19T09:33:59.693-08:00Palin's Stump SpeechREPUBLICAN VICE PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE GOVERNOR SARAH PALIN REMARKS AT A "ROAD TO VICTORY" RALLY LOCATION: CLEARWATER, FLORIDA TIME: 9:00 A.M. EDT DATE: MONDAY, OCTOBER 6, 2008<br /><br /><br />GOV. PALIN: <span style="color:#cc33cc;">Thank you</span> so much. <span style="color:#cc33cc;">Thank you</span> so much. <span style="color:#cc33cc;">Thank you</span> so much. And Senator Lieberman, thank you for that kind introduction. And it is so good to have all of you here today. As Senator Lieberman just said, he's never seen so many people up so early and we <span style="color:#cc33cc;">thank you</span> for making that sacrifice. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(</span><span style="color:#cc0000;">It's nine AM.)</span><br />(Applause.) <span style="color:#cc0000;">(</span><span style="color:#cc0000;">Now comes the pander-fest: mention location and sport team.)</span><br /><span style="color:#cc33cc;">Thank you</span> so much for that very, very warm welcome to the state of <span style="color:#006600;">Florida.</span> You take my breath away. <span style="color:#cc33cc;">Thank you</span>, <span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span>.<br />(Applause.)<br />The flags are beautiful. <span style="color:#cc33cc;">Thank you</span> for that also. God bless America. You guys get it. <span style="color:#cc33cc;">Thank you</span>.<br />(Applause.)<br />It's great to be here in the home of the <span style="color:#336666;">Tampa Bay Rays</span>, too. (Applause.)<br />I know that earlier some of the experts this year are kind of tough on the <span style="color:#336666;">Rays</span>. I've been there. But what a difference a season can make. And now the <span style="color:#336666;">Rays</span> are in the playoffs for the first time ever. <span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span> knows a little something about turning an underdog into a victor, and together that's what we can do.<br />(Applause.)<br />How about it <span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span>? Let us do that for Senator John McCain.<br />(Applause.)<br />So the last time that our campaign came to <span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span> it was up in the villages and it was so much fun. Thousands of people out there. Golf carts everywhere. We got such a kick out of that, that was cool. Thousands of people out there to hear our message of reform and positive change. And they came there like you today because the people of <span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span> are ready to shake things up in Washington. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(</span><span style="color:#cc0000;">What? How long before you actually <strong>say </strong>something?)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />So John McCain and I, we are taking our cause and our case for reform to every voter of every background in every region of America. Whether you're a Republican or a Democrat or an Independent, <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Alaska Independence Party?) </span>maybe you don't belong to any party at all, we're asking for your vote. And it's going to be a hard fought contest. Right here in<span style="color:#006600;"> Florida</span> it's going to be a tough contest. With your support, though, we'll win <span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span>.<br />(Applause.)<br />We'll win for you.<br />(Applause.) <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Still waiting for you to say something</span><span style="color:#cc0000;">.)</span><br />So, I wanted to come here a couple of days earlier but I had an appointment in St. Louis that just wouldn't wait.<br />(Applause.)<br />And so on Thursday night I had a little debate with Senator Joe Biden.<br />(Boos.)<br />Joseph Biden is a decent man, he is. And I enjoyed meeting him for the first time. I was so proud, though, to get to make the case for the next president of the United States, John McCain.<br />(Applause.) As I explained to Senator Biden, John McCain is the only man in this race who will solve our economic crisis and not exploit it. And he's the only man in this race with a plan that will actually help our working families, and cut your taxes, and get our economy back on track.<br />(Applause.) <span style="color:#cc0000;">(</span><span style="color:#cc0000;">By</span> <span style="color:#cc0000;">Mr. McCain's own admission the economy is his weak suit.)</span><br />He's the only man in this race who talks about the wars that America is fighting and he isn't afraid to use the word victory. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(</span><span style="color:#cc0000;">Our own commanders in the field don't talk about "victory", but about "success".) </span><br />(Applause.)<br />Our opponent gives speech after speech about the wars that America is fighting and it sure would be nice if just once he'd say that he wants America to win. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Succeed?)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />See our opponent voted to cut off funding for our troops even after saying that he would never do so. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(</span><span style="color:#cc0000;">Misleading.</span> <span style="color:#cc0000;">Voted against one of two competing bills. Voted for the other, and ultimately, of course, supported the funding. McCain did the same thing, for the other version.)</span><br />(Boos.)<br />And he said that our troops in Afghanistan are just quote, "raiding villages and killing civilians."<br />(Boos.) <span style="color:#cc0000;">(</span><span style="color:#cc0000;">Out of context. Was commenting on a specific case. Everyone else also agreed the soldiers in question were in the wrong. It's war, it happens.)</span><br />And that's not what our brave men and women in uniform are doing in Afghanistan. The U.S. military is fighting terrorism and protecting us and our values.<br />(Applause.)<br />And they're building schools for children in Afghanistan so that there is hope and there is opportunity in that country. That is what our troops are doing and they deserve our gratitude and they deserve our support. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(</span><span style="color:#cc0000;">Obama supports a major increase in our presence in Afghanistan.)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />See, John McCain is a different kind of man. He believes in our troops and their mission. And as the mother of one of those troops that's exactly the kind of man I want as commander in chief.<br />(Applause.)<br />Man, some of your signs just make me want to cry. Thank you so much. I love you guys.<br />(Applause.) Thank you.<br />(Applause.) <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Sniffle. Now let's see how many times I can say "Florida", and pander to veterans.)<br /></span>Senator McCain -- Senator McCain served our nation in<span style="color:#000099;"> uniform</span> for 22 years, five and a half years he was a <span style="color:#000099;">POW</span>. In fact, it was after graduating from the <span style="color:#000099;">Naval Academy,</span> he was stationed right here in <span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span>. That's where he learned to do what he does, here in <span style="color:#009900;">Florida</span>.<br />(Applause.)<br />And<span style="color:#006600;"> Florida</span>, it was in your skies that he trained to become a <span style="color:#000099;">naval aviator</span>. And Senator McCain is proud to have been part of <span style="color:#006600;">Florida'</span>s strong tradition of <span style="color:#000099;">military service</span>. And today, we're proud of all the<span style="color:#006600;"> Floridians</span> who have worn <span style="color:#000099;">our country's uniform</span>. Your state is home to millions.<br />(Applause.)<br /><span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span> is home to millions of our<span style="color:#000099;"> veterans</span> and many of our nation's <span style="color:#000099;">active duty soldiers</span> and <span style="color:#000099;">airmen</span>. And they continue to keep our nation strong and secure. And I know that here in the audience there are <span style="color:#000099;">veterans</span>, there are those who are serving today. <span style="color:#000099;">Would you do me the honor, raise your hand, let us applaud you? Thank you, guys.<br /></span>(Applause.)<br /><span style="color:#000099;">We thank you and we love you guys. Thank you -- and gals, thank you.</span><br />(Applause.) <span style="color:#cc0000;">( Hang on. </span><span style="color:#cc0000;">Has she actually<strong> said</strong> anything yet?)</span><br /><span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span>, in just 29 days it will be the time for choosing in this election. And here's how I look at the choice that we face. In politics there are some candidates who use change to just promote their careers. And then there are those leaders, like John McCain, who use their career to promote change. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(</span><span style="color:#cc0000;">The writers worked all night on that one.)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />This is a moment when principles and political independence matter a lot more than just the party line, as Senator Lieberman just told you. It matters a lot more than just the party line. John McCain is his own man. He doesn't run with the Washington herd. And he and I don't just talk about change, we're the only candidates in this race with a track record of actually making change happen. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(</span><span style="color:#cc0000;">Lieberman was McCain's hands down choice for VP. McCain was convinced by hardliners to run with the herd and choose a "base" candidate, Palin.)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />As mayor and as a governor, I reminded people that government is not always the answer. In fact, government too often is the problem. So we got back to basics and we put government back on the side of the people.<br />As mayor, I eliminated taxes on personal property and I eliminated taxes like small business inventory taxes. Those burdens on our small businesses, we got rid of them. Property taxes were too high. Every year that I was in office I reduced that (mill levy ?). <span style="color:#cc0000;">(</span><span style="color:#cc0000;">And built a gigantic, publicly funded, sport complex.)</span><br />And as governor, I brought the same agenda of positive change on a state level. I came to office promising to control spending, by request if possible, but by veto if necessary. And today, our state budget is under control and we have a surplus. And I put the veto pen to nearly half a billion dollars in wasteful spending. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(She actually vetoes the entire budget, then has the Legislature come to her in small groups and lobby for each individual road or school.)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />We suspended our state fuel tax and I'm returning a chunk of our surplus money right back to the people of Alaska. It's their money and they can spend it better than government can spend it for them. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Of course Alaskans don't pay state taxes. Its the oil tax money she's spreading around. Redistribution of wealth? Not that I'm complaining.)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />Imagine that. Imagine that, having that principle. And that's what we're going to bring on a national level also. That principle of knowing that -- no, the people, our families, our businesses they know best so let them keep more of what they earn and produce and not have this government take trying to quote, "solve" all the problems for our families and our businesses. No, we're not going to do that. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Huh? Hang on, I think she's trying to say something of substance. She just compared giving oil company tax money directly to the people with letting companies keep "more of what they earn" and not expecting government to solve our problems. Oh wait, that doesn't make any sense)<br /></span>I've always known that I was accountable to the people who hired me. There, it was the people of Alaska. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Which is why she promised to serve out her term just before she accepted the VP nod) </span>And in a McCain-Palin administration I promise you that we will never forget that we'll be there in D.C. to work for you the people of America.<br />(Applause.)<br />So one mission of a McCain-Palin administration will be to set this nation firmly on a course of energy independence. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Drill, baby, drill! Drill, baby, drill! No? Not yet?)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />Across <span style="color:#006600;">Florida </span>and all across America, high gas prices is making a full tank at the pump seem like a luxury. And the cost of living, of course, is going up. And the cost of groceries is going up. Everything is going up, but the value of your paycheck is going down. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(So let's here it for tax cuts for rich people!) </span>And that's because of high energy costs. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Oh. I thought it was because I work at WalMart) </span>So, to meet America's great energy challenge we're going to need an all of the above approach. And that, in a McCain-Palin administration, will mean developing new alternative energy sources. And it will mean requiring to build more nuclear power plants. And in <span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span>, it means alternative sources of energy like wind and solar. God has so richly blessed you here.<br />(Applause.) <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Drill, baby, dr...not yet?)</span><br />Look at these sources of energy here in <span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span> that are still sitting untapped. And we'll tap into them, along with environmentally friendly off shore production. We do need to drill here and drill now. Now you can chant the drill baby drill.<br />(Applause.) <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Yes! Now, how many time can you say "American"?)<br /></span>It's as simple as this, Florida. In a McCain-Palin administration we will achieve energy security for our country. It is a matter of national security and economic prosperity. That means <span style="color:#000066;">American</span> energy resources brought to you by<span style="color:#000066;"> American</span> ingenuity and produced by <span style="color:#000066;">American</span> workers.<br />(Applause.)<br />And we're also going to bring tax relief to every<span style="color:#000066;"> <span style="color:#cc0000;">(rich)</span>American</span> and cut taxes for businesses so you business owners you can hire more people. That's how jobs are created. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Thanks for clearing that up.)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />Here again, John McCain is the real reformer. In this election, he is the real reformer and he can do this and he has a record to prove it. And so do I, as a mayor, as a governor who cut taxes for the people of Alaska. You know, in this campaign, in this election, I think the phoniest claim in a campaign that's been full of them, is that Barack Obama is going to cut your taxes? <span style="color:#cc0000;">(That's right its only for ninety five percent of us.)</span><br />(Boos.)<br />I mean, think about it. He's built his whole career on doling out tax money, first as a Chicago politician, and then raising taxes as a senator. He's voted 94 times to raise taxes. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(McCain voted to spend the money, but borrows from China to get it. We owe over $400,000 per person right now. Painful as it will be we gotta pay for it someday, somehow.)</span><br />(Boos.)<br />Even on middle class every day working <span style="color:#000066;">Americans</span> making $42,000 a year, he voted to raise those taxes. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Not true) </span>And he tried to waste a million dollars a day just on his requested earmarks. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(As mayor and Governor, Palin was a fervent fan of earmarks.) </span>And now, he's committed to almost a trillion dollars in new government spending. And yet, he never bothers to explain where all that's going to come from to pay for all of that. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(China?) </span>And dog gone it, no one seems to be asking him how is he going to pay for the huge government growth that he wants. No one is asking him. So you all, just do the math. Either do the math or just go with your gut. In either way, you're going to come up with the same conclusion, Barack Obama is going to raise your taxes. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Actually if you do the math Obama will cut your taxes. For our purposes here, better go with your gut.)</span><br />(Boos.)<br />So, there's a pattern here of a left-wing agenda that is packaged and prettied up to look like mainstream policies. And everybody knows that this country has got to be put back on the right track. But the problem with our opponent's agenda is that higher taxes and bigger government and activist courts and retreat in war, that's not the right track for our country. That's another dead end. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Let's see, if you borrow from China instead of raise taxes, and recognize that we retreated in Afghanistan to go to Iraq, those are all the Bush policies that McCain still supports.)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />We have that plan to put our country back on the right track. Okay now <span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span>, evidently there's some interest in what I've been reading lately. And I think that this comes from -- it's a result of a probably less than successful interview that I had recently with kind of mainstream media. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Just the kind of clear speaking that served you so well in that interview.)</span><br />(Boos.)<br />Yet, you know what, in response to critics after that interview what I should have told them was I was just trying to keep Tina Fey in business, just giving her more information. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(True, she gets laughs by quoting you verbatim.)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />Job security for SNL characters. All right. Really in that interview I was just getting really impatient because I was so convinced that <span style="color:#000099;">Americans</span> want to hear about the issues that are so important in your life: how to win the war, how to get the economy back on track, public education, accountability in our schools, more choices for our parents with education. Those things. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(It all comes to her, now.)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />So, I do have to apologize, though, for being a little bit impatient, a little bit annoyed. But anyways, so one of the questions about well what do I read everyday? <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Cereal boxes?) </span>And my answer was sort of flippant, <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Actually you could not name a newspaper that you read.) </span>Well, I was reading my copy of the New York Times the other day, okay.<br />(Boos.)<br />And I knew you guys would react that way, okay. So I'm reading the New York Times, though, and I was really interested to read about Barack's friends from Chicago, as the New York Times (put it ?). <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Cue appeal to fear.)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />Now it turns out one of his earliest supporters is a man named Bill Ayers.<br />(Boos.)<br />And according to the New York Times he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that quote, "launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol."<br />(Boos.)<br />And then there's even more to the story. Barack Obama says that Ayers was just someone in the neighborhood, but that's less than truthful. His own top adviser said that they were quote, "certainly friendly." In fact, Obama held one of his first meetings of his political career in Bill Ayers living room. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Just plain not true.)</span><br />(Boos.)<br />And they worked together on various projects in Chicago. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(School reform, on a Republican sponsored board.) </span>And, you know, these are the same guys who think that patriotism is paying higher taxes. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(We all know patriotism is making your kids pay higher taxes.)</span><br />(Boos.)<span style="color:#cc0000;"> (OK, now let's talk about how afraid we should all be.)</span><br />Remember, that's what Joe Biden had said. And I am just so <span style="color:#6633ff;">fearful </span>that this is not a man who sees America the way that you and I see <span style="color:#000099;">America</span>, as the greatest source for good in this world.<br />(Applause.)<br />I'm <span style="color:#6633ff;">afraid</span> this is someone who sees <span style="color:#000099;">America</span> as imperfect enough to work with a former domestic terrorist who had targeted his own country.<br />(Boos.) <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Great! You made it sound like Obama is bombing the Pentagon. I am very afraid. Now throw out a Reagan reference, and bring it home:)</span><br />This, ladies and gentlemen, has nothing to do with the kind of change that anyone can believe in, not my kids, not for your kids. What we believe in is what <span style="color:#663333;">Ronald Reagan</span> believed in, and that is <span style="color:#000099;">America</span> is an exceptional nation.<br />(Applause.) <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Everybody chant!)</span><br />(Chant of USA) Remember <span style="color:#663300;">Ronald Reagan</span> used to talk about America being that shining city on a hill for all mankind to see and that<span style="color:#000099;"> America</span> is a good and honorable nation. We are not a perfect nation but we learn from our mistakes. And individually, no we are not perfect; but collectively together<span style="color:#000099;"> America</span> represents a perfect ideal. It's freedom. It's tolerance. It's respect for equal rights. It is those things that our military men and women have fought and died for, and freedom is worth fighting for. <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Yay! Individually we ain't much, but as a howling mob, we're perfect!)</span><br />(Applause.)<br />So look at the contrasts. On November 4th, you'll have that choice, the contrasts. The only man who can take on Washington is Senator John McCain.<br />(Applause.)<br />Okay, so <span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span> you know that you're going to have to hang onto your hats because from now until election day it may get kind of rough.<span style="color:#cc0000;"> (We might for instance start calling Obama a terrorist.) </span>That's all right. You're going to hear our opponents still go on and on about how they're going to fight for you. But since he won't say it on his own behalf, I've had to kind of make it my business to say it for him.<span style="color:#cc0000;"> (?) </span>There is only one man in this campaign who has ever really fought for you.<br />(Applause.)<br />He has the courage to go on fighting for you. That man is John McCain so God bless you for supporting John McCain. Thank you, <span style="color:#006600;">Florida</span>. God bless you and God bless <span style="color:#000099;">America</span>.<br />(Applause.) <span style="color:#cc0000;">(Um, did she ever really really tell us what they plan to <strong>do</strong>, if elected? Oh well, I'm stoked. Let's go to a bar and beat up a gay.)</span><br />Thank you.<br /><span style="color:#cc0000;">(Torches and pitchforks will be available as you exit.)</span><br /><br /><a href="http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/10/the-odd-lies-11.html">http://andrewsullivan.theatlantic.com/the_daily_dish/2008/10/the-odd-lies-11.html</a>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-42644907036117035692008-10-17T07:56:00.004-08:002008-10-17T09:38:05.341-08:00Senator Stevens Sin: A Fall from Faith in Democracy<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDymmie_8XJ6InQoFWOuvN5ZDGSbECkO_9kv5iuyczSRyhrhebUpDVzgSIgkcmpDXnUowwR3qvAG45Fxdi0TR-dW5_lqaLD5mZ0dKUmJbK4l8ygI7oDdf_KhMxgkARoa-op-m85IgsjucI/s1600-h/Uncle+Ted.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5258178471455670770" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgDymmie_8XJ6InQoFWOuvN5ZDGSbECkO_9kv5iuyczSRyhrhebUpDVzgSIgkcmpDXnUowwR3qvAG45Fxdi0TR-dW5_lqaLD5mZ0dKUmJbK4l8ygI7oDdf_KhMxgkARoa-op-m85IgsjucI/s400/Uncle+Ted.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><div>As Uncle Ted takes the stand today in his own defense he will claim to be so obtuse that he was unaware of the existence or value of gifts laid at his feet. <span style="color:#000099;">It is red faced grass kicking lie, like that of a boy caught by his mother breaking rules he thinks are stupid.</span> The barely concealed current running through the recorded phone conversations between Stevens and former pal Allen is that the rules are wrong, not them.</div><br /><br /><div>Because Stevens is a fallen angel.</div><br /><div></div><br /><div>His faith in the messy, loud and inaccurate system of government that is a democratic republic has been bleached out of him in his long years wrassling laws in the Senate. He is like the Catholic priest whose long years in a cynical system have made him forget the goodness that still sits in the pews.</div><br /><div></div><br /><div>His implicit motto is the famous quote from <em>Men In Black</em>: </div><br /><div><span style="color:#000099;">"A person is smart. People are dumb panicky animals, and you know it."</span></div><br /><div></div><br /><div>I can understand this, to a degree. Here in Kodiak our quest to build a new police station has been a study in the inefficiencies of democracy. A City Dictator, conferring with a few of our prominent citizens, could have decreed a new station site despite the howls of the ignorant masses that it is in the wrong place. Could have saved us a couple of million dollars. Of course the station would have gone where the citizens didn't want it. But citizens are like children. They don't know what they really need.</div><br /><div></div><br /><div>Uncle Ted truly believes that it is better to confer with the Captains of Industry than to sift through the clamor of the masses. This is his true crime--his every action as a Senator is guided, not by the needs and wishes of his electorate, but by a close contingent of confederates and associates that he has come to trust. </div><br /><div></div><br /><div>Perhaps Mr. Begich will one day be worn down from dealing with the dunderheads of democracy. At that point he should quit, as Uncle Ted should have, long ago. Because swimming in the sea of the citizenry is what a public servant does. It is not a job you can do sipping champagne on the shore with your homeboys.<br /></div><br /><div><a href="http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1008/14649.html">http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1008/14649.html</a></div>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-72714721502394715142008-10-16T08:22:00.003-08:002008-10-16T09:11:29.772-08:00Senator McScrappy Wrong Skipper for Ship of State<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFMLJnvByQ9jk__on8dI0HkfC3GMDnoMU6VwrcQv_IDLpWJ70HDtEbgto4zyOUk9bEP0NMHuI_krfM6J0frrOYSt5hpDJ135F9p76VnmO3oDBjC-0v06eoIj5lHX2pvh2d7N1BzgbvgCsD/s1600-h/Rally.jpg"><img id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5257800511542555538" style="FLOAT: right; MARGIN: 0px 0px 10px 10px; CURSOR: hand" alt="" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiFMLJnvByQ9jk__on8dI0HkfC3GMDnoMU6VwrcQv_IDLpWJ70HDtEbgto4zyOUk9bEP0NMHuI_krfM6J0frrOYSt5hpDJ135F9p76VnmO3oDBjC-0v06eoIj5lHX2pvh2d7N1BzgbvgCsD/s400/Rally.jpg" border="0" /></a><br /><div><span style="color:#000099;">Both candidates for the US Presidency were looking up-all-night haggard</span> as they gave their early morning comments to the press about the cartwheeling stock market on the day of their final debate.<br /><br />Obama suggested some short term life rings, including letting the cash strapped middle class dip into their retirement money without penalty.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">McCain said "I'm a fighter"</span> and flew into a flurry of furious chest beating pro wrestler pronouncements. He would "take on" the profiteers of Wall Street as he had members of his own party in the Senate. This is a central theme of McCain's campaign: the scrappy fighter who will battle on in Iraq, combat spending in Washington, butt heads with Russia and drop veto bombs on the Democrats in Congress. He is the raging bull of this election.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">In sharp contrast, Obama's talent is in forceful negotiation.</span> From his days heading the Harvard Law Review to his time in the US Senate he has shown himself adept at bringing combatants to an area of common ground and compelling them to cooperate based on mutual benefit. Lincoln amazed pundits of the time when he kept his fiercest rivals close by giving them high level cabinet posts. Forced into the same room with a man of Lincoln's talents, the men (including Seward, a patron saint of Alaska) became a very effective team at a time in history when we needed it most.<br /><br />I appreciate McCain's tenacity, and I think I now have a clearer view of the Senator's role as a volatile and passionate spur to that sometimes sluggish body. But his combative nature and admittedly impulsive style of decision making are not what this nation, or this planet, needs right now. We need a skipper with a steady hand.<br /><br /><span style="color:#cc0000;">Because the nature of the skipper determines the culture of the boat.</span><br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">Some skippers tear around town in their pickups without a plan,</span> quickpatching the equipment, yelling at the crew, leaving the dock at the last minute to arrive on the grounds just in time to overload the boat on the port side and nearly roll over, but you barely get all the fish down without sinking and head back to town where you will do most of the gearwork before the skipper shows up to tell you he wants to change out all the hooks so you'll have to do the gearwork all over again but he just got a tendering contract so you can do that and paint the boat while you pack salmon unless he sells the boat next week. These people are exciting to work with and can even be successful, right up to the moment they sink the boat.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">John McCain is that kind of skipper: hot-headed, impulsive, driving without a compass.</span> Early on his campaign squandered its first twenty four million dollars, fired its staff and rolled into New Hampshire listing badly. Since then he has been tearing around the nation in his pickup- without a coherent message, but catching enough votes to make it pay. Straight talk was junked for Bush style win-at-any-cost politics. He has patched together a crazy coalition of independents who used to like him and hardliners who used to hate him (Republicans seem strangely caught between self-loathing and loathing for everyone else.)<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">In contrast Obama's campaign has been the height of cool efficiency.</span> Again he has attracted a coalition of talented and dedicated people united by their common ground, its bounds so well articulated by Mr. Obama. He is a skipper who inspires confidence, and hard work.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">At the debate McCain wants to fight.</span> Fidgeting and grimacing in his chair, he throws his haymakers-- invoking the "anger" of the public over "redistribution of wealth" and "sitting down with terrorists". Jake LaMotta has his head down and is punching furiously. He's swinging wild. In the end he looks frustrated.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">Obama has his head up.</span> He has stepped easily away from McCain's charge. He is looking into the camera. He seems to be looking beyond Mr. McCain. He's talking to us now. Articulating the common ground where we can all meet, and fix this country.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/08/05/presidential-debate-moder_n_117048.html">http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/08/05/presidential-debate-moder_n_117048.html</a></div>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-78116367067240044212008-10-13T10:32:00.005-08:002008-10-14T09:36:52.815-08:00State Paid For Palin's PR Consultant<div align="center"><span style="font-size:180%;color:#cc0000;">National Media Blitz Powered By Gas</span></div><br /><br /><div align="center">Did you wonder why Sarah Palin was suddenly in the national spotlight just before John McCain started casting around for a VP? </div><br /><span style="color:#003300;">Give the credit to Marcia Brier, <span style="color:#000066;">a Massachusetts based public relations expert hired by the state of Alaska to promote the Governor.</span> <span style="color:#cc0000;">The state paid $31,000 to Brier</span>, who pushed Palin in prepackaged stories like "Big Oil Under Siege", which painted Palin as a firebrand maverick who singlehandedly defeated the oil companies and drove through the gas pipeline package.</span><br /><span style="color:#003300;"></span><br /><span style="color:#000000;">In a story linked below, Washington Post reporter Kimberly Kindy reveals the <span style="color:#330099;">Alaska Department of Natural Resources hired Brier</span> to <span style="color:#000099;">sell Palin</span> so she could in turn<span style="color:#000099;"> sell the gas pipeline.</span> Brier hammered the media with prewritten stories, or "pitches" that characterized Palin as the single driving force who backed down the oil companies, tamed the Alaska Legislature and gave birth to the gasline all alone in the Wasilla wilderness.</span><br /><br />This would no doubt come as a surprise to the many Alaska statesmen who drew a line in the tundra and refused to buckle down to the old guard and their oily masters--Berkowitz, LeDoux, Ramras, French...it is Alaska's Legislature who has the dirt of the pipeline under its fingernails, and deserves most of the credit.<span style="color:#003300;"> Meanwhile <span style="color:#cc0000;">"Where's Sarah?"</span> buttons became common in Juneau as the Guv became increasingly obsessed with courting the media. </span>She had already shown a distinct distaste for the capitol, preferring to rule from Wasilla and collect a per diem for working away from J-town. And for the time she spent meeting privately with executives of ExxonMobil and Marathon Oil in early 2007.<br /><span style="color:#003300;"></span><br /><span style="color:#003300;">After the Legislature passed the gas pipeline incentive plan the media campaign really took off. Suddenly Brier had takers for her Palin stories. </span><span style="color:#000000;"><span style="color:#cc0000;">But the media pieces had much less to do with gas than with the selling of Sarah.</span> Stories in People and Fortune magazines, the New York Times, the Washington Post, Fox News, 60 Minutes and the Wall Street Journal all focused on Palin's person, not the pipeline.</span><br /><br /><span style="color:#cc0000;">And the minute she was picked as VP candidate the contract with Brier was terminated.</span><br /><span style="color:#003300;">"We'd achieved our objective with getting the national attention," said Palin staffer Kurt Gibson said. "There was no need anymore to use state money to achieve that." </span><br /><span style="color:#003300;"></span><br /><span style="color:#003300;">Uh-Huh. What was that objective again?</span><br /><span style="color:#000000;"></span><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><br /><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/09/AR2008100903429_3.html?sid=ST2008100903556&s_pos">http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/09/AR2008100903429_3.html?sid=ST2008100903556&s_pos</a>=<br /><br /><a href="http://news.spreadit.org/sarah-palin-vogue-magazinesarah-palin-vogue-picture-interview/">http://news.spreadit.org/sarah-palin-vogue-magazinesarah-palin-vogue-picture-interview/</a><br /><br /><br /><a href="http://voices.washingtonpost.com/washingtonpostinvestigations/2008/09/palin_per_diem_travel_expenses.html">http://voices.washingtonpost.com/washingtonpostinvestigations/2008/09/palin_per_diem_travel_expenses.html</a>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-2852308253331587732008-10-13T09:17:00.009-08:002008-10-17T07:31:10.105-08:00Thanks for Ruining Our Governor<div align="center"><span style="font-size:180%;color:#000099;">Trying to close the Troopergate after the Facts have Escaped</span></div><br />Hubris. Its a disease. A swelling of the ego that blocks all other brain function.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">Why did Governor Palin accept the VP nomination?</span> She must have known that there were dozens of GOP politicians better qualified for the job. She must have known that it directly contradicted her promise to serve out her term as governor.<br /><br /><span style="color:#cc0000;">And she definitely knew about Troopergate.</span><br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">It's outrageous that the McCain campaign spent money trying to quash the Alaska Legislature's report on Troopergate.</span> I remember reading ADN's well reported headline story on Troopergate just after Monegan was fired. We now know officially what we all learned way back then. That the governor had allowed surrogates to lobby for the firing of a trooper who happened to be the guv's ex-brother-in-law. Head Trooper Monegan refused to fiddle with their stonefaced system of review. Head Trooper Monegan got fired.<br /><br />The trooper sounded like a terrible cop. I think most Alaskans assumed she had good reasons to want the trooper fired. And they realized that she is Monegan's boss. She can fire him if she wants. But it was pretty obvious that she had made a rookie mistake by not reining in those who would act on her behalf, outside the bounds of government. I think most of us figured she would get a meaningless but well-intended investigation into the matter after which the legislature would harrumph about refining the ethics rules and the trooper would be fired quietly in the background. And so it should have ended, the Governor's first scrape with scandal and a lesson learned all around.<br /><br /><span style="color:#000099;">Then the VP nod pushed her, and all Alaskans, into the national spotlight.</span> We haven't been doing very well in the spotlight. Governor Palin has been giving speeches laced with fear and fury all across the country, smiling on as roaring crowds yell out "Kill 'im!" and "Terrorist!". Next stop the Munich beer hall circuit. And the topper- having to watch smirking news analysts play footage of her contradicting nearly exactly the findings of our meaningless but well-intended investigation.<br /><br />Darn it, she was playing her role just fine up here. A kind of Wasilla Ice Queen that the noblemen of the Legislature approached with a sweeping bow and a budget in hand.<br /><br />You big city folk just had to tempt her with your bright lights and fancy stylists.<br /><br /><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/08/AR2008100802928.html">http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/10/08/AR2008100802928.html</a>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-6371820689290587282008-10-10T07:21:00.008-08:002008-10-11T08:53:51.731-08:00Flip This Economy<div align="center"><span style="font-size:180%;">I<span style="color:#003300;"> can tell you the first person who knew in his guts that something in this economy was terribly, terribly wrong.</span></span></div><div align="center"><span style="font-size:180%;color:#003300;"></span></div><div align="center"><span style="font-size:180%;color:#003300;"></span></div><div align="center"><span style="color:#003300;"></span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000000;"><span style="color:#cc0000;">He was slumped over the wheel on I-80</span>, stuck in a gridlock, halfway into the two hour daily lemming run into the city. </span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000000;">All around him, far as the eye could see, were people just like him. Blinking in traffic next to empty latte cups, idling away gas they couldn't afford to get to jobs they might lose, vainly trying to keep up with expanding mortgages on houses a hundred miles away from where they work. All because every single converted clothes closet in the city was going for a million bucks.</span></div><div align="left"></div><div align="left">As he sat there looking over at the shadow faced driver in the lane next door, nodding, like himself, to the "Dink and Dork in the Morning Show", he must have thought:</div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;">"This can't be right. How much can one crappy apartment in San Francisco really be worth?"</span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;"></span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;"></span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000000;">Somehow, in between the <span style="color:#000099;">"Flip This House"</span> type TV shows and the <span style="color:#000066;">late night no money down</span> infomercials, we were convinced that selling real estate back and forth to each other at exponentially increasing prices qualifies as an industry. The entire ponzi scheme is based on the idea that someone even stupider than you will come along with a bigger wheelbarrow full of money and cash you out.</span><span style="color:#000099;"> That guy then paints the porch and waits for a bigger idiot, perhaps someone in a clown suit driving up the driveway in a shiny dumptruck full of money.</span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000099;"></span></div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;">Yes, it was glorious. A balloon payment, fee encrusted, high interest, high profit gold rush--all paid for by the next guy. But if all those real estate players had no jobs, no credit ratings and no cash, then where exactly did all the money come from?</span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;"></span></div><div align="left"></div><div align="left">Enter woolen skinned men in tall glassy cubicles. <span style="color:#cc0000;">Specifically AIG,</span> the investment wizards to whom the <span style="color:#000099;">US taxpayers are now handing our wallets</span>. Only recently they liked to brag that they invented the investment vehicle by which both their fantastically wealthy clients and the banks where we all put our money made unbelievable profits on the real estate idiot chain. All you had to do is bundle up the "risky" high interest home loans (often mixed with safer stuff like your municipal bonds for schools and sewers). Then you just <span style="color:#000099;">keep pouring money on them, kind of like gasoline on a nice toasty fire</span>. Just put enough loose money into the hands of clowns pulling dumptrucks into the driveways of recently remodeled McMansions and the whole system works wonderfully. The money you dump onto the idiot chain comes flowing back to your investors from the <span style="color:#000066;">unbelievably high interest rates on the loans</span>. Meanwhile fees and consultation services and sales commissions can keep a company like AIG in the spas six months out of the year- good spas too, where young girls whip you with eucalyptus branches while they recite lines from "The Art of War".</div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;">Yes the whole system works beautifully <span style="color:#cc0000;">until that last clown never comes up the driveway</span>. You don't want to be the last idiot in the idiot chain. </span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;">Like every pyramid scheme it finally collapsed under its own weight.</span></div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;"></span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000099;">If there's anything to be proud of in all this it is that we apparently suckered the entire planet in. Yep, its the biggest scam of all time.</span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#000099;"></span></div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;"></span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;"></span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;"></span></div><div align="left"><span style="color:#003300;"></span></div>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1545996036132165961.post-44676256845347002662008-10-09T08:36:00.005-08:002008-10-09T09:48:17.714-08:00McCain Can't Catch a Wave, Uncle Ted for President<div align="center"><span style="font-size:130%;color:#cc0000;">Did you know that Alaska's Senator Ted Stevens was a pioneering surfer?</span> </div><div align="center"> </div><div align="left">Say what you will about Alaska's Senior Sourpuss, the man knows when to sit on his board and when to paddle. Since before statehood he has shown the knack for recognizing a rising groundswell and riding it well. Even now, sitting on his board in federal court with shoals of evidence all around him he is waiting for the right moment to start paddling. Sure enough, his prosecutors have bumbled him up a wave of mistakes. He may ride out of this one yet.</div><div align="left"> </div><div align="left">John McCain, on the other hand can't catch a wave. Eight years ago he tried "straight talk" and was obliterated by the Bush sleaze machine. This time he went to the dark side only to be swept off his board by a wave of hope and honesty. Whether its the war in Iraq, the economy, drilling our way to energy independance, or the idiocy of picking Governor Palingate, he always seems a day late, a dollar short.</div><div align="left"> </div><div align="left">Is it too late for the Republicans to run Uncle Ted?</div><div align="left"> </div><div align="center"> </div><div align="left"> </div>Mr. Fisherhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14930839694671088731noreply@blogger.com0